


star in darkness

by BlackJacketsandPens



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: (including a cameo by one of my friends' ocs HI ELENA), F/M, and clearly i can't even write shippy without making it Angst AF, because i needed to write it and it just Happened, its canon to me, my self-indulgent canon/oc fic, optional happy ending epilogue tho
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-26
Updated: 2017-08-26
Packaged: 2018-12-20 06:34:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 15
Words: 34,739
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11915193
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlackJacketsandPens/pseuds/BlackJacketsandPens
Summary: "Love sought is good, but given unsought is better."-- William ShakespeareA daemonologist in Zegnautus makes the acquaintance of one Imperial Chancellor; it's only a simple work relationship at first, but despite what either of them intend, life has a strange way of happening sometimes. (An Ardyn/OC fic; shamelessly fluffy, but also with piles of angst befitting a story following XV canon.)





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I wasn't actually going to post this, but then I threw caution to the wind and went: why not? 
> 
> Really, I just wanted to make Ardyn happy at least a little, and, well...things happened. Carina is my darling girl, and I really enjoyed fleshing her out throughout the fic. 
> 
> (chapter 1: in which verstael is a dick and ardyn meets someone interesting)

Being chancellor was...well, it was certainly not the most _important_ of positions. Oh, he was high-ranked and influential, of course, but that was more due to his gifts of knowledge than anything else. As chancellor, it was more a gifted title to show the Empire’s _appreciation_ than anything properly earned. 

He mainly sat in an office all day and went through tedious paperwork, signing off on this pointless bit of foreign policy, or that bit of thinly disguised tyranny, having conversations with the figureheads of Accordo and dealing with the very surly High Commander -- in his capacity as prince and de facto leader of Tenebrae, of course. It was ridiculously boring; after all, what need was there for a foreign minister in a dictatorship?

He had kicked up his feet on his desk and leaned back in his chair, stretching and preparing for a nap, when there was a knock on his office door. He paused, letting his chair right itself as he returned -- with a slight wince -- to a proper sitting position, and tilted his head curiously -- now who was this? Normally his few visitors didn’t knock.

“Come in,” he said leaning his elbows on his desk and head in his hands. 

The door swung open, and a young woman walked in. She was in her late twenties or early thirties, perhaps, with brown hair in a loose, messy ponytail and brown eyes behind glasses. The lab coat marked her as one of Verstael’s researchers, and underneath it she dressed rather more casually than most, jeans and white loafers visible beneath the coat. She was carrying a thick folder, and she looked a bit -- well, more than a bit -- nervous.

“Um--” She began. “Chancellor Izunia? I-I was, um, sent by Minister Besithia. He wanted me to give you these to look over…”

Ardyn had to chuckle -- his reputation clearly preceded him. What reputation, he wasn’t entirely sure, but whatever it was, it was exactly what he wanted. “Give it here, then, my dear,” he said, gesturing for her to bring the folder over. The researcher blinked, and then nodded, moving over to hand it to him.

He dropped it unceremoniously on his desk as soon as it was in his hands, opening it and beginning to sift through the papers, aware that the woman was waiting for a response or dismissal and letting her wait for it. It was the usual bullshit from Verstael, it seemed -- pages upon pages upon updates to their study on daemons, all of it either things Ardyn already knew or more and more of how to apply all of this information to weapons and other instruments of war. Nothing that he hadn’t seen in every single folder before this one. 

It irritated him, in all honesty -- he’d brought them the knowledge of daemons that had allowed the Empire to become a magitek industry above all others, creating the MTs and their other weapons. And _only_ weapons, apparently. It was necessary, of course, for his end goal. He needed them to do this so he could get what he wanted. But at the same time, it was...difficult to watch; especially Verstael's increasingly monstrous work. 

But then again, he’d cut himself off from whatever scraps of humanity he had left centuries ago. It was easy to turn off his discomfort and distaste, so like always, he did -- until he got to the last few pages of the folder, coming across a sheaf of papers of noticeably lower quality than the rest, slightly crumpled sheets of standard printer paper held together with a green paperclip, sitting haphazardly in the folder.

“What’s this, now?” He mused curiously, completely aware that the researcher still waiting to be dismissed had stiffened in nervous terror. He took the papers out of the folder and closed it, tapping them on the desk to straighten them out and began to read.

 _Preventative Medicine in Regards to the Starscourge: An Incomplete Study,_ the first sheet said. _Test Batches #1 through #76 included._

He blinked once, then twice, finding himself unconsciously flipping through the rest of the papers. The heading hadn’t lied -- the report contained detailed results on a good seventy-plus attempts to create and refine a preventative vaccine for the _Starscourge_ , of all things. All failures so far, of course, but he had to give them credit for being so stubborn -- they’d manage to get the last batch of rats to go for nearly a _week_ without entering stage one, which was a start. A rather small start, but a start all the same. The notes and documentation were all detailed and incredibly precise, and he had to admit he was impressed.

But beyond that-- to so brazenly attempt to create a vaccine for the Scourge? To be so _stubborn_ in that attempt?

The plague in his own blood almost seemed that much more hard to ignore as he thought about it. Of course, it was too late for him to be vaccinated, but...he shook his head, cutting off any nostalgic thoughts, and returned to the front of the sheaf of papers, finally looking up at the visibly nervous researcher.

“So, Doctor--” He paused, glancing down to read the name on the cover page. “Doctor Anseris, is it? Is this your work?”

Dr. Anseris gulped. “Y-Yes, sir,” she admitted. “It is. It was-- it was stupid of me to have slipped it in there, I know, I apologize, just-- just please, sir, don’t tell Minister Besithia I’ve kept working on it…”

Ardyn held up a hand. “Hold on a moment, doctor,” he said, his lips twitching. “Do you mean to tell me that not only are you working on this monumental project on your own and without approval, you’ve been told to stop _and_ proceeded to completely ignore that instruction?” 

She flinched, her shoulders coming up defensively. “Y-Yes,” she admitted, her voice small. “I just thought…”

“Just thought what?” Ardyn asked, rising to his feet (and entirely aware of the effect it would have). “Come on now, don’t _whisper_. Just _what_ , doctor?”

She swallowed, eyes flickering around the room, but then -- as he’d hoped -- she squared her shoulders and looked up at him. He was surprised by the set of her jaw and the sheer defiance in her gaze, though; he’d expected to intimidate her into talking, of course, but her reaction was...a bit more than he’d guessed.

“I just thought that it was important that there be preventative measures,” she said, her voice firm. “Especally with all the work that we do with daemons. So many people in the annexed areas have been getting sick -- I’ve seen the statistics, too, sir -- and we don’t do anything to help. We don’t even warn half our staff of the potential for infection, let alone look into any way to keep our own researchers from catching the Scourge. We may win the war, sir, but -- and I mean no offense -- if we don’t figure out some way to end the plague, we may well end up losing anyway.”

Ardyn couldn’t help it -- he _smiled_. The doctor seemed startled, but that just made it better. “You think we can end the Scourge?” He asked her.

She swallowed. “Yes,” she answered after a moment. “The Scourge may have been created by an Astral, according to the legends, but it’s a biological plague -- we’ve proven that. I’ve seen the microorganisms myself under a microscope. And if it’s biological, I believe that it has a scientific cure.” She licked her lips. “O-Of course, the vaccine needs to come first before I can even dream of working on a cure, but-- I think it’s possible, yes.”

Ardyn didn’t say anything after that, not at first, simply sitting back down and watching her. She really, truly believed that a cure was possible. “What about the legends?” He asked. “The Chosen King, all of that?”

The woman shrugged. “I’m from Tenebrae by birth, sir,” she explained. “I grew up with the legends and the Oracle and all that. And yes, I believe in all of it. But we didn’t come this far by just sitting and waiting for the gods to do something for us, did we? I don’t see any harm in trying to solve our problems by ourselves.”

And that caused Ardyn to laugh. The woman’s confused expression only made him chuckle again, and he shook his head. “I like you, Doctor Anseris,” he said, glancing down at the papers again. “Ah, Carina, is it? I like you. You have passion and a vision I’ll admit I find both quite rare in Niflheim and refreshing. It’s not often you see someone who genuinely cares about the people.”

He tapped her papers. “This doesn’t leave my office, I can assure you of that,” he told her. “And in fact, I want you to bring me regular updates on your work as well as what Verstael sends, as I’m almost entirely certain he chose you as his errand girl to distract you from your fancies and he’ll continue to send you along with his folders. I’m fascinated, to be quite honest, and I’d very much enjoy seeing how your pet project continues.”

“I--” Her voice cracked slightly. “Yes, sir! I’ll-- I’ll do that. Thank you, sir.” 

Ardyn laughed again. “Oh, please, no thanks necessary,” he said, waving a hand. “Now shoo. Go tell Verstael you dropped the paperwork off, and I’ll see him tomorrow about it.”

Carina nodded and departed, breezing out the door in moments -- not surprising, he reflected. He’d probably nearly given her at least two heart attacks in the span of twenty minutes or so. Which was far from unusual of course, but…

 _She_ was far from _usual_. He hadn’t lied when he said he was fascinated. To find someone actually concerned about the Scourge’s spread in this apathetic, military-minded Empire? And to find that she’s _doing_ something about it, damn those who tell her not to and her own scant successes? To find someone that actually believes -- and genuinely so; he can spot a liar from a mile away -- that there can be a cure made by human hands, _without_ the gods’ help?

Well. He hadn’t heard that kind of sentiment in...a _very_ long time.

That old nostalgia threatened again to bubble up, those old human feelings, and he shoved them right back down. Curiosity, that was all it was. Who would finish first -- would Ardyn succeed, first, or would this brave little oddity of a scientist pull it off? It would be something to pass the time, at least. That’s all it was.

All it was.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note: You might notice if you reread, but I changed Spica's name to Carina because #reasons. Still the same good baby girl tho!


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which ardyn keeps giving dr. anseris heart attacks, and she decides he's more fascinating than she'd initially thought.

Doctor Carina Lucida Anseris really didn't have many hobbies -- or friends, for that matter. Most of the other researchers at Zegnautus thought of her as 'Daemon Girl’ at best and a freak at worst. Not that she minded.

As long as she had her work, that was enough. No one to go home to, after all -- hell, she lived in a little single-occupant dorm in employee housing on base. This was enough.

Her and her little lab, that was all she needed. 

(Well, okay, that was a lie. But it was all she figured she could hope for, so she would settle.)

It was late, really late -- not quite in the small hours of the morning, but past midnight -- and she was still in her lab, working. She really didn’t need to worry about staying so late, as she lived on the base, so she tended to work as late as it took for her to finish whatever she’d been working on that day. Sometimes she didn’t sleep at all, or fell asleep in her chair. Didn’t really matter; no one tended to notice, after all.

Tonight she was finishing up work on batch 83 of the potential vaccine -- she planned to start the trial tomorrow, time willing, so she had to finish preparing the doses before she headed back to her quarters. She was almost done though -- she just needed to alter the amounts of the additive chemicals added to the base vaccine (genes from the Scourge protozoa and antigens to activate the immune system). She’d figured out by test twenty-eight that it was the additives she needed to adjust and work on, so that’s what she’d focused on since. One of these attempts would work eventually, or give her some clue as to the next step in her fine-tuning...until, then, though.

Sighing, she carried the tray of vials to the lab shaker on the other side of her workspace, setting it inside and turning it on. Once that was done mixing, she’d just have to put it in the fridge until tomorrow. She yawned, glancing at the digital clock on her desk, and walked back to clean up the other side of the workspace. 

Her lab was incredibly small in comparison to most. One workspace in the middle of the room, big enough for one half to be her workstation and the other to hold the fancier equipment (the fridge and other appliances tucked beneath the counters), a bookshelf in the right corner by the sliding door, and her desk shoved into the left corner, small and flanked by filing cabinets and wall-mounted cabinets that contained bottles and vials and spare supplies. The rest of the room had only a blackboard on the right-hand wall, and the back wall was taken up by a long series of glassed-in shelves (cupboards at the bottom quarter that was her main storage) that contained her precious samples.

There were _dozens_ of them, accumulated over the five years she’d been a fully-fledged researcher here. She used a decent chunk of her salary to get her hands on what she couldn’t get via the MTs and other official channels, but she didn’t care. She needed them. 

There was two shelves containing at least a dozen or so jars half-filled with slime collected from flan and gelatin and other members of the same genus; a veritable rainbow of them. One shelf was occupied by samples of bomb flesh, the crackling red of grenades, sparking purple of galvanades, and smooth white-blue of cryonades. Another held fragments of armor off iron giants, and still another had mindflayer tentacles and legs from Arachnes. Teeth and claws, weapons, scraps of cloth, all samples from daemons collected over the years. She’d installed low-power sun lamps in the shelving to keep the samples dormant, and in the dim light of the lab (kept that way on purpose, as the Scourge was photophobic) they all lit up the back wall like dozens of stars.

She crouched to the fridge, opening it and digging for a bag she’d put in there a little while ago, pulling it out and heading over to the wall beneath the blackboard, where her cages sat. “Hey, guys,” she said, kneeling and putting down the plastic bag, grabbing the box sitting on top of the cages and opening the door, filling the bowls with food pellets for the dozen rats within. “Here you go,” she said, opening the plastic bag and adding some nuts to their meal. “Special day tomorrow, so you get a treat.”

Another large chunk of her funds went to the rats -- she had to feed them herself, and keep buying more when each batch inevitably died to the Scourge. She did feel bad about it, but the only other alternative was human testing, and she’d rather die than test the vaccine on humans this early. She knew what failure meant. So that meant rats and more rats until she was ready.

Once those were fed, she moved to the smaller cage, this one with a single occupant and with another low-power sunlamp sitting on top. “Hey, Greenie,” she said, carefully pouring the rest of the bag’s contents -- nuts, chopped fruit, and some raw sahagin liver -- into the bowl, pulling her hand out quickly. The tonberry inside the cage chirped at her, bowing to eat, and she stood to throw the bag away. 

It was at that moment that the sliding door opened, and Carina let out a startled squeal, dropping the bag and jolting in surprise -- only to go several shades of pink when she saw the Chancellor in the doorway. The _Chancellor_.

“I-I-- Chancellor Izunia!” She yelped. “What are you doing here so late?! What-- d-did I forget something?”

The man laughed, entering her lab and glancing around it, an eyebrow raised. She had to admit the Chancellor was intimidating -- he always had this look on his face like he was permanently amused by something only he knew, and his eyes (while admittedly the very pretty color of golden syrup or honey) were deep enough to drown in, and she didn’t think she wanted to know what was in those depths. Or that _anyone_ did. But at the same time, he’d been nothing but decent to her for the past three months of their acquaintance. She’d spoken to him four or five more times since their first meeting, delivering folders from Verstael; he’d been right in that the Minister was using her as his delivery girl, and probably right that he was doing it to prevent her from working on any side projects. She’d continued anyway, of course, a little confident now that she had the Chancellors’ approval, and had delivered her own reports to him as well.

“Can’t I just stop in to say hello?” He asked, his voice as always casual in an almost practiced manner. It was eerie; it made his entire demeanour seem like it was staged. “I was still in the building and realized I had never been by to see my favorite researcher’s laboratory.” He paused. “It’s...small.”

Carina reddened. “Y-Yes, well. You know how Minister Besithia feels about me…” She mumbled, but he seemed to ignore her, wandering the circuit around her worktables. He stopped in front of the sample shelves, hands behind his back, and she moved to stand next to him.

“The lights keep them dormant,” she explained. “But I keep it dim in here -- and use the lowest setting on the lamps -- so I don’t destroy the samples outright. It took some fine-tuning to get the ideal balance, but...”

“You kept trying, clearly,” he noted, and once again she was able to see something odd flash in his eyes, too quickly to tell what it was. “You continue to be a very persistent, stubborn scientist -- always a good quality to have. How on Eos have you managed to get this many samples?”

“Official channels, badgering other researchers or the human soldiers sent out in the field,” she explained. “Sometimes I hire hunters to bring back bits. That’s how I got Greenie.” She gestured, and she smiled to herself at the widening of his eyes -- now it was her turn to surprise him.

“You…have a pet tonberry,” he said after a moment, his lips twitching.

She laughed. “Yes,” she replied. “I couldn’t bear to kill him once I got him; I was really impressed by how docile he was, and how easily the hunter caught him. I feed him a few times a week, a mix of different things, and keep his light low just to make sure he doesn’t get loose or get hurt...he’s sweet, though I don’t dare touch him without gloves.”

“A very good idea,” the Chancellor said, walking past her and crouching to the daemon’s level, resting his fingers on the cage bars. The tonberry chirruped again and nosed the bars where his hand was, and he patted the metal before retracting his hand. “It does seem incredibly good-natured for a daemon, I’ll say that,” he added, glancing up at her. “You took its knife?”

“Yeah, and its lantern, just in case,” Carina added. “I gave it a toy instead, and it doesn’t seem to mind the switch.”

The Chancellor stood, looking almost strangely genuine in his smile this time. “Very clever,” he said. “You seem to know what you’re doing. I have to restate what I said when we first met -- you are certainly a rarity around here, and the Empire could use more minds like yours.”

“O-Oh,” Carina said, startled. There she goes again, still blushing. How does he keep doing that? It isn’t like she’s never been complimented before. But...this is different. The praise of her teachers and other superiors had been empty, shallow. Praising her talents as they moved down the line to praise all the other top students and bright researchers. Certainly no one had praised her recently -- she was a nail that stuck out, after all. No one wanted to hear what she had to say. Except the Chancellor, apparently. 

“Thank you,” she said, and stiffened a little when he reached out to pat her head, ruffling her hair a little. 

“No, no, no need to thank me,” he said with a laugh. “Just keep up the good work, my dear.”

He stepped away, trailing fingers along the edge of her workstation, and stopped just in front of the door, turning. 

“Carina, dear?” He began, but then stopped. That strange look flickered through his eyes again, and then he shook his head, chuckling to himself. “Don’t let this place take that compassion of yours.” That said, he nodded to her, tipped an imaginary hat, and left.

She blinked after him. “...what?” She said, frowning slightly. That had been _odd_. The visit, of course, but...so were his parting words. No, those were even more strange. Why had he said that? It didn’t sound like him. Or what she knew of him, at least. 

Hm. Well, she didn’t really think it would do her much good to contemplate it. Not much point. She sighed, yawned, glanced around her lab, and moved to grab her bag before heading out herself. She had a lot of work to do tomorrow, and nothing left to do here for the night. Might as well head to bed.

Odd visits aside, this would be another memory tomorrow. Nothing else but to keep going.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i absolutely love carina's lab, fight me. also i will defend greenie to the death, he's a good boy.
> 
> poor girl is like WHY IS HE LIKE THIS constantly, and honestly who wouldn't be? xD
> 
> (also ch 2, in which i bullshit my way through science talk because how the fuck even -- i promise i looked up IRL malaria vaccines tho!!!)


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which the chancellor seems to be home sick, and carina surprises herself several times in quick succession.

In the six years that Carina had worked for the Empire, and the year of that she’d known Chancellor Izunia more familiarly, she’d never seen him like this.

She’d been picking up some daemon samples from another researcher, and passed him in the hall leaving Minister Besithia’s office. He’d looked….sick, for lack of a better word. Pale, with dark shadows under his eyes and a heavy step, seeming to almost noticeably favor his left side. No one else seemed to pick up on it, but perhaps that was because of his eyes -- almost daring anyone to say something, golden brown darkened to a colder color. Perhaps no one saw because no one wanted to see.

She thought about saying something -- for a brief, dizzying moment it was on the tip of her tongue, wondering what would happen if she broke the illusion. But she hesitated, and he passed her, and the moment was gone.

She let out her breath, shook her head, and kept walking, the sealed box with a hecteye’s eye inside it tucked underneath her arm. It wasn’t her problem in the end, was it? The Chancellor was a private man. If he was sick, he’d be well soon enough. He never seemed to fall ill, anyway, always working...she shouldn’t worry.

(Shouldn’t, however, didn’t mean that she _didn’t_. Silly as it was.)

* * *

 

Two days later, though, it seemed as if her worries held merit after all. It seemed as if the Chancellor wasn’t in his office, and asking around -- for he had no secretary -- seemed to come up with the answer that he hadn’t been in at all.

And of course, Minister Besithia didn’t take that as an answer when she returned to his office with the folder still in her arms. She faced his ire and cringed through it, glancing sporadically at the door in the hopes she could make an escape, but a paper with an address on it was shoved under her nose.

“The Chancellor’s address,” he said sharply. “Deliver it.”

And really, one couldn’t afford to disobey or ignore a direct command from Minister Verstael Besithia.

Having no car of her own, she hopped on one of the trams going in and out of the base, taking it to the closest station to the address and walking the rest of the way. Thankfully it wasn’t that far and the weather was halfway decent -- but still, she was nervous. She didn’t know what to expect. What kind of house would the Chancellor of Niflheim have? A mansion? A townhouse? How fancy was it? And here she is, out of her lab coat, wearing a plain green sweater, jeans, and scuffed loafers. God, would the guards even let her in? What if there were guards? What was she supposed to say?

Of course, this whole train of thought stopped dead once she reached the address. She had to look from paper to building three times before it sank in -- it was an apartment building. A higher-end apartment building, but still completely average in most respects. An apartment building. One of the most important people in the entire Empire _lived in an apartment_. He never ceased to surprise her.

She entered the building, hefting her bag nervously on her shoulder, and checked with the man at the front desk -- she showed him her ID badge from Zegnautus, and he gave her the Chancellor’s apartment number; a relief, really. She hadn’t been sure if that would work. But it did, so she took the elevator up to his floor (not even a penthouse, really?) and knocked nervously on his door, shifting from foot to foot.

There was a long silence, and eventually she heard the Chancellor behind the door, his voice muffled. “.... _Carina?_ What are you…?”

“H-Hello, Chancellor,” she said, managing a smile. “I’m-- I’m really sorry. Minister Besithia wouldn’t...he made me bring you the file…”

A muffled sigh, and she could swear she heard him let his head thump against the door. “No, no, don’t apologize,” he said. “It’s not your fault the minister is an insufferable--” He broke off to cough, and Carina was instantly worried again. “--never mind,” he said after a moment. “I can’t send you back to him with the folder, I suppose, lest he take it out on you, so…”

The door unlocked and swung inward, and Carina stepped into the dim apartment. The door shut behind her and the Chancellor stepped into her field of vision, and she...blinked. And blinked again.

He looked...if he’d looked sick before, he looked even worse now. Pale, eyes ringed with shadow and hair and stubble unkempt, dressed only in a loose black shirt and grey sweatpants, and she swore he was shaking just standing upright. He must have seen something in her eyes, though, because he took the folder and turned away, carrying it -- and walking stiffly, visibly limping now -- to the counter that divided the kitchen with the living room. “I suppose I’ll read it at some point today,” he said, and she could tell now that she was in the same room that his voice was hoarse and scratchy. “Don’t worry. You did your job, you won’t be in trouble.”

“Alright,” she said, though she didn’t really make a move to leave just yet. “Are...are you okay?” She asked finally, glancing around the living room and kitchen, visible over the counter. Both rooms seemed strangely sparse -- aside from the usual kitchen appliances, stove, microwave, oven, and fridge, the kitchen seemed empty, and aside from a TV and an overstuffed couch, the living room wasn’t much better. There were two half-filled bookshelves in the living room, though, and a few soft-looking blankets were folded over the back of the couch. Still -- it was very…empty.

“Fine,” the Chancellor reassured her. “Nothing to be worried about -- it’s fine. I’m perfectly fine.”

She didn’t believe him in the slightest, though. “Are you sure?” She asked, and he looked almost surprised before nodding.

“Quite sure, my dear,” he told her, lips twitching in an almost-smile. “I’m perfectly--” He had to cut himself off again to cough, but this fit seemed worse than the last -- he had to brace himself on the counter to keep from falling, and Carina almost instinctively moved to catch him. Her fingers touched the bare flesh of his forearm, slick with sweat, and her eyes widened.

“You’re burning up!” She yelped. “You-- you have a fever, you should really be in bed, Chancellor--”

He managed to get the coughing under control, though it took him a few moments longer than normal to catch his breath, gasping for air and looking nauseous. “I’m fine,” he managed, lips twitching, though for the first time his smile didn’t seem quite so genuine. “You...really don’t need to worry, dear.”

“How can I not worry when you’re feverish, coughing up a lung, and you look absolutely terrible? You're _limping!”_ Carina demanded, forgetting herself. “I saw you two days ago and I knew you didn’t look well, but you look _worse_ now! This isn’t nothing -- it can’t be nothing if you didn’t even come to work!” She shook her head. “Let me _do something_ , Chancellor, are you-- are you taking any medicine? Have you eaten anything today? Do you know what you’ve got?”

She trailed off eventually when she realized he was staring, all pretenses seemingly gone and leaving him looking completely stunned. Then he laughed, and she was almost even more taken off-guard by how _sad_ it sounded. “I do,” he rasped eventually. “It’s...chronic. Comes and goes every so often. Or...it gets _worse_ every so often, I should say. Normally it’s ignorable. But every once in awhile...” He waved a hand at himself, still leaning heavily on the counter. “It goes away after a day or three, Carina. I’ll be fine.”

She blinked, and then frowned even more deeply. “You’ve got a chronic illness and-- and you’re just going to, what, sleep for a few days until the symptoms get bearable again?” Despite only knowing him passingly well, only having spoken to him a few times a month for the past year and knowing full well she didn’t know anything about him...it hurt to hear that. It really did. “That’s-- _god_ , Chancellor, do you know how that sounds?”

“...No?” He said, his eyebrow rising. “It sounds perfectly reasonable to me.”

 _It sounds perfectly masochistic,_ she wanted to say, _with a side helping of absolutely depressing and completely ridiculous_. But she refrained. “Not to me,” she said. “Look, I’m going to take care of you today. Just because it’s a chronic illness doesn’t mean you can just-- ignore it.” She huffed, and without really thinking grabbed his arm again, tugging him away from the counter towards the couch. She felt a moment’s resistance (and a moment where she thought he'd fall, which made her feel guilty) before he let her, and she made him sit. He watched her with almost stunned bemusement, leaning back against the couch and sighing as she grabbed one of the throws and shook it out to drape over his shoulders.

“Stay,” she said firmly. “I’m going to fix you something to eat.”

She headed over to the kitchen, but the Chancellor’s voice floated from behind her, sounding almost sheepish underneath his somewhat disbelieving amusement. “You really don’t need to do any of this.”

“No, you’re right,” she agreed. “I don’t. But I want to, so I am. I may not know you very well, that’s true, but you’re right in front of me and you’re sick, so I’m going to take care of you. Isn’t that what people do?”

She heard him laugh, but he didn’t respond to that, so she set about searching the kitchen for something to make him for lunch.

Of course, ten minutes later, she was about ready to completely disregard her previous statement and strangle him instead. “Chancellor?” She asked slowly, coming back over to the couch and standing over him, hands on her hips. She was somewhat pleased to see that he wasn’t quite meeting her gaze, though a wry smile still played on his lips. “Why is there no food in your house?”

“That’s not quite accurate...” he began, but she cut him off with a groan.

“Chancellor, two bottles of iced coffee, half of box of leftover Accordan takeout pasta, a container of bakery croissants four days past the expiry date, and an entire cabinet of liquor _is not food_. And yet somehow, that is literally _everything in the entire kitchen_.”

He blinked. “Ah,” he said. “Well, I suppose...it’s not the best stocked of pantries, but…”

“No buts,” she snapped. “Do you-- what do you _eat?!_ This is-- you’re--” She groaned again, putting her the heels of her hands on her temples. “I’m not going to yell at you. You’re sick. I’m not going to yell at you.”

She shook her head, rubbing her temples. “Okay,” she said. “Where’s the nearest grocery store or other shopping center? I don’t really leave the base all that often.”

He stared at her. “You’re not seriously going to--” She cut him off with a look, and he sighed. “There’s a little shopping mall down the street,” he said eventually. “Leave the complex and head two blocks left. You’ll see it on the opposite corner of the street. There’s a little grocery store in there, I think. Has a drugstore, too, if you’re that insistent on being my nursemaid.”

“Thank you,” she said, sighing. “I’ll be back soon. Just…stay on the couch, alright? I’ll knock when I get back.”

He shook his head. “Keys are on the hook by the door, take them,” he said. “Don’t lose them, though. I’m rather possessive of my car keys.”

“I won’t,” she promised. “Be back in a little while.”

It wasn’t until she had left the apartment building, the Chancellor’s keys (a half-dozen on the ring along with a ridiculously cute black chocobo keychain that had made her giggle) in her pocket, that she processed what she’d just done -- berating, lecturing, and fussing almost aggressively over the _Imperial Chancellor_ \-- and what she was doing -- buying him groceries, medicine, and whatever other necessities he might not even have. She let out a tiny little horrified whimper and sank to a crouch, hands over her mouth.

“Oh my god,” she managed. “Oh my _god_. What am I _doing?_ ” She barely knew him! Sure, she’d spoken to him on a semi-regular basis for a year now, but that didn’t mean anything! She’d known from the start that everything about the man was a calculated act, performative and insincere, no one ever really knowing what went on in his head. She’d known that. Everyone did. To her, he was just the Chancellor, eccentric and strange.

The Chancellor, who had read her project and cared. Liked it enough to keep it secret for her. Encouraged her to continue it, complimented her. Asked about it -- and intelligent questions, too. Challenged her to stand up for her values and compassion. The only man on the entire base who seemed to think she had ideas worth hearing, worth exploring. The only person who called her _Carina_.

“Goddamnit,” she muttered, standing and shaking her head, turning left to head down the street.

Even if he was the Chancellor, eccentric, unreadable, and completely beyond her ken -- he was the closest thing she had to a friend. And she didn’t want to just ignore his suffering, especially if he was so keen on doing just that. The glimpses she’d seen just now, momentary things but more than the unreadable flashes she’d caught before...they seemed so unbearably _sad_.

So no, she decided, heading to the store. She wasn’t leaving him alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> carina is just AAAAA WHAT AM I DOING AAAAAA while ardyn is just ???????????
> 
> poor ardyn; chronic illness my ass. i mean he's telling the truth, sort of, but LOL BOY IT AIN'T NO FLU. and really, you could at least pretend to be human. your pantry is suspicious af.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which we see how ardyn feels about this whole 'aggressively fussing' thing and he decides to be a very selfish man.

For a few minutes after the door shut behind Carina, Ardyn just...stared at it. At least now that he was alone in his apartment he could react properly without concern for appearances -- but he really didn’t know quite _how_. 

And wasn’t that just sad, he reflected, shifting to lie on his side on the couch, sighing and burying himself in the blanket she’d unfolded for him. Not knowing how to react to basic human decency. But then again, it wasn’t like he hadn’t been pushing people away for the past several centuries. He was very good at that -- most people saw the performance he put on, eccentric and strange and somewhat disquieting despite his affability, and left him well enough alone. He liked it that way. He had his own plans, his own business to attend to, and he really didn’t need to be weighed down by any attachments to humans. Mortals. Frail little things that die so easily.

(The tiny little scraps of humanity still in him pointed out that it was also a self-defense mechanism, but he studiously ignored them as always.)

And yet here this little girl was. Of course, he’d taken an interest in her -- she was a scientist, a researcher, but with more compassion and passionate stubbornness than he’d seen in anyone else in Zegnautus. The only one that seemed to give a damn about something besides how to use daemons in this ridiculous war. Granted, he’d helped start the war by giving them the knowledge in the first place, but he didn’t necessarily see it as a good thing. It was means to an end, but it was also...a waste of life and resources. War was never a good thing. It was regrettable, but...it needed to happen. Unfortunately. 

And oh, did the Empire fulfill their role with gusto. Iedolas was a power-hungry madman, bent on usurping the Lucian kings and their role, taking the crystal and everything else. Ardyn thought that was particularly hilarious, but hell, whatever worked for the old man. He’d soon see his folly. Too late to stop, of course. He and Verstael and most of the army cheerfully oiled their shining steel war machine with the black slime of the Scourge, ignoring the countries they conquered and their suffering people, just grasping for more and more and _more_. If he didn’t need them, he’d probably have stabbed them all in the back ages ago.

But this one little girl seemed to have a vision for something else. A vision everyone seemed to want to crush, but she persevered. Working in her little hole-in-the-wall lab for over two years now by his estimate, test after test with a fervent desire to end the Scourge with a wall of samples and an endless supply of rats to try her vaccines on. He had to admire that sort of strength of will in the face of the plainly obvious fact that she was the only one who gave a damn about it.

But then today she’d surprised him even more. A year he’d known her, and all their interactions had been business -- she’d deliver the files from Verstael and her own reports, and he’d occasionally have her sit and answer questions on her work. She’d give him detailed responses despite her anxiousness, and that was that. They weren’t friends. They were barely even acquaintances. 

Anyone else would have dropped off the files with him and left right away, too unnerved by the fact that someone so important lived in a small apartment and by Ardyn in general (as was the intent), but she...didn’t. She’d stayed, lingered long enough to realize he was sick -- and had actually dared to _say something_ about it, which he’d assumed he’d trained people out of by now. Be quietly intimidating enough, be unpredictable enough, and no one calls you out on anything. Yet she had. Not just about his ‘chronic illness’, but about the state of his kitchen. And she’d badgered him into letting her take care of him.

He really didn’t need that. It wasn’t anything he wasn’t used to. He was the Scourge in a cage of flesh, yes, but the fact that he’d once been human meant that the symptoms of the Scourge affected him just like anyone else. The headaches, the ache in his muscles and bones, and the fatigue -- that never went away. Always lingered around him, but after two thousand years, it was easy to ignore, as was the old and ill-healed injury that left him with a leg and hip that refused to work as it should (and added another hurt to the pile). A few painkillers every so often, lots of coffee, and that was that. Nothing to worry about.

Every so often, though, as predictable as clockwork, the symptoms would worsen along with the pain. He’d get a few days of abject misery -- fever, coughing, chills, nausea...not to mention constant dizziness and an irritating difficulty in catching his breath. Normally he’d just grab some fever reducers and anti-nausea medication and hide in his office for the duration of the bad spell, and no one would be the wiser. Sometimes he’d even stay home, like now, sulking in a dimly lit apartment, and of course no one questioned it.

Until _her_ , damn it. _And_ she was a daemonologist. With any luck the fact that it was ‘chronic’ and that he’d been around for so long would throw her off the trail, but she wasn’t stupid. She knew the symptoms of the Scourge. This was something he couldn’t afford. But hell, here she was anyway. It was frustrating, and he wasn’t the state of mind or the mood to figure out a way out of it. At least if he could avoid coughing or throwing up black ichor in her presence, she might not catch on. 

He really didn’t need to be worrying about this. The end of things was close, he could feel it, and he really didn’t have the time to concern himself with Doctor Anseris and her insistence on worrying about him as if he were someone who needed that. ~~As if he were human.~~

Another sigh escaped him, and he closed his eyes. He’d handle this after the bad spell was over. He was just too damn tired to really protest. If she wanted to fuss for a day, then fine. Being a little spoiled might be nice, anyway. That hadn’t happened in...oh, god, centuries. More than centuries. 

So lost in thoughts was he that he completely missed her return, only noticing when the door clicked shut and there as the sound of a few plastic bags hitting the counter. He startled, eyes opening, and sat up to peer over the back of the couch. “Back already, I see.”

“It’s been two hours,” she pointed out with a slight smile -- her venture out of the apartment had seemed to relax her nerves a little. “That was a nice grocery store. I couldn’t buy much, since I only have two hands and no car, but I did get you some basics.”

He raised his eyebrows. “Oh?” He asked. Really, she hadn’t needed to do that. Aside from the Scourge stealing most of his appetite as it was, it wasn’t like starvation would _kill_ him. He didn’t really need to eat, and wasn’t hungry most of the time anyway. But apparently he should have taken a little more care with keeping up appearances. Not that he expected anyone to raid his kitchen, but…

“Mm,” she said, starting to unpack her purchases. “Some bread, stuff for sandwiches -- deli meat and cheese, mostly, but I bought a little variety pack of condiments since I don’t know what you like on sandwiches besides that.” She shrugged. “Cereal, milk, butter, some cans of soup and prepackaged microwave dinners…since the croissants are past the expiry date, I got you some bakery stuff -- cookies. I didn’t know what kind you like, so I got the assorted box.” She finished putting the groceries away and crumpled up the bags, bending to throw them away. “It’s not much, but at least there’s food in here now.”

He was glad she wasn’t looking at him, honestly -- she missed the completely gobsmacked expression on his face. She’d been completely serious, hadn’t she? She really _had_ bought him groceries. Good god. Was he that delirious, or-- was she really doing this whole ‘caring about him’ thing? He blinked and watched her stand again, schooling his face back into a less stupidly shocked expression, and it was then he noticed the other bags still on the counter. “Clearly the grocery wasn’t your only stop,” he noted, a little bewildered.

“What? Oh,” she laughed. “Yeah, I stopped at the drugstore, too. I got you some medicine -- I, um, don’t really know what kind of chronic illness you have, but I know you have a fever, so I got you something for that, and I got you some cough medicine, too. Adult stuff, not the gross kid’s syrup.”

“God bless you for that,” he said, sounding slightly amused, and she laughed, moving to get a cup of water and bringing both that and the medicine over. It really wouldn’t cure anything, but it would certainly ease the symptoms for a little while. He took the glass and the pills from her, only to freeze in place as she put her hand on his forehead, brushing some damp hair out of his face. 

“Mmhm, still feverish,” she said, pulling her hand away so he could take the medicine -- which he did, of course; he wasn’t _that_ caught off-guard. (Yet.) “I got a couple other things too, just because I didn’t know what else might help. Um…”

He chuckled. “Leave it on the counter for now,” he told her. “I’ll go through it later.” 

She sighed, but nodded. “Okay,” she said, shifting and twining her fingers together. “My mother--” She began suddenly, cutting herself off in embarrassment before continuing. “My mother used to say, um-- that baths were good for fevers.”

He couldn’t help the smile. “Why, Carina, are you trying to get me out of my clothes?” He asked, and she turned bright red, cringing. A moment later he thought better of the teasing, and sighed. “Your mother has a point,” he added. “Does wonders for chronic pain, as well.”

He immediately regretted that last sentence when her features sharpened with worry again, and he sighed. “I’m fine,” he said for what felt like the fifteenth time that day. “Stop that. Your face will freeze that way.”

 _“You_ sound like my mother, now,” she ventured to tease him, and his laugh reassured her enough to relax. “A-Anyway, that’s alright, then. You should go take a bath. I’ll, um...make you something to eat while you do.”

He stood with a wince, folding the blanket and draping it on the couch. “If you insist,” he said. “I’ll do my best not to fall asleep.”

“Well, I won’t stop you if you do,” she replied. “I’ll knock if you take too long, though. Just-- um, one second.” She stepped away as he moved around the couch, rummaging in the bag she’d left on the counter and coming back up with a bottle. “I, um, was thinking about that earlier, when I was shopping. So I went looking, and-- here.” She shoved the bottle at him, looking deeply embarrassed again, and he took it, turning it over in his hands to see what it was. 

He blinked, startled, and then had to smile. The bottle’s label read _Soothing Bath Oil,_ and really, it was nothing more than scented stuff to put in the bath -- lavender vanilla, according to the label. “Really?” He asked. “That’s sweet.”

She flushed deeper. “I-It was spur of the moment,” she admitted. “I mean, it’s-- I don’t--”

He laughed. “Stop that,” he told her. “I appreciate the thought. Now didn’t you say you were going to make lunch? I’ll go and put this to use.”

She relaxed slightly. “Y-Yeah,” she said. “I was-- I’ll do that.”

She headed back around the counter to the itchen, and he took the short hallway across from the front door to the bathroom -- it was on the left, while his bedroom was on the right. The bathroom was fairly small, though the bathtub was nice and deep and came with a showerhead, and it really was rather sparsely stocked, too, if he had to admit it. The usual basics for a bathroom -- soap, shampoo, toothbrush, et cetera -- and his medication in the bathroom cabinet, a towel on the rack behind the door...that was basically it. He didn’t tend to really keep many things outside of necessities. Didn’t see the point.

He stripped quickly, grimacing as he realized his clothes were sticky with sweat -- ew, he really never paid much attention to that, and he _should_. Ew. He’d have to grab a change of clothes after the bath. He was certainly grateful that she was most likely far too nervous and embarrassed to walk in on him, really -- the darkened veins beneath his clothes were a dead giveaway for what exactly his illness was, and he couldn’t explain away the pale scars that lined his arms and chest, either. They were all scars from wounds that should and would have killed a normal man -- but he _wasn’t_ normal, and so all they left behind was a reminder that he was immortal etched in his skin.

In any case, that was something she wasn’t about to see -- or anyone else would see, for that matter. Bending with a muffled groan, he turned on the water and grabbed the bath oil, scanning the back before shrugging and pouring some of it in.

He had to admit -- he might easily fall asleep with this if he hadn’t been worrying about another person in his apartment. In fact, he knew he would if he ever used this when alone. It was also...nostalgic, in a sad sort of way. Someone he’d known long ago in another life...she had smelled like this, and...it almost saddened him, if he hadn’t been numb to that pain by now.

Either way, it certainly did help with the pain, and he almost missed the nervous rap on the bathroom door. “Chancellor? Lunch is ready...” 

“Be just a moment,” he called back, shaking the drowsiness off. By the time he made the two-foot dash to his bedroom, towel around his waist, she’d retreated to the kitchen -- good, because he’d have had to laugh if she’d seen him in a state of undress, seeing as she’d more than likely freak out. Hey, he had never said he was _nice_. Even if he did still appreciate her fussing, in a sort of surprised and resigned way.

Dressed in clean clothes, he returned to the kitchen and living room. The doctor smiled a little shyly, sliding a sandwich on over. “I’m not a very good cook, but even I can make sandwiches, so...”

“And it’s most likely a very good sandwich,” he teased her. She’d made one for herself, too, and they ate in relative silence, leaning on the counter. It was a bit odd, he reflected. They really weren’t friends -- or at least, didn’t know each other all that well -- but here they were, getting on like they were. Which was stupid and ridiculous, of course, because he _really_ couldn’t afford that. He was not the kind of person who could have friends. Or _should_ , really. He was the Accursed, and aside from that, he was planning to tear the world down. Friends would...complicate that. And he’d come too far for complications.

And yet when thinking about pushing her away, decisively ending whatever budding camaraderie was there between him and the doctor...he really didn’t want to. Not out of a desire to save her feelings or anything kind like that -- it was just the sheer selfish desire to ease his loneliness, for however brief a time. If she wanted to be friends, then...hell, maybe he’d let her. Even if he didn’t feel the same, she’d be company he sorely needed.

He was certainly a monstrous creature, wasn’t he? Even so...he’d keep this, for now. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ardyn is a giant walking hot mess isn't he? just. an absolute mess. how do you function, sir? do you even. giant walking clusterfuck of a man :'D
> 
> oh carina you have no idea what you're getting into.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which ardyn is full of mischief and carina has to deal with Feelings on top of all that, too.

“Good morning, Carina!”

She jumped, turning from her laptop to face the desk, and then smiled. “Chancellor!” She saved her document and stood, leaning on the desk. “Good morning.”

It was good to see him-- in the months since she’d visited him for the first time, they’d ended up becoming friends in truth. She still wasn't sure why the Chancellor, of all people, was so willing to befriend her, but…it was nice. Her first friend -- hell, her _only_ friend. They’d spoken a lot more over time, about lots of things -- he’d visited the lab a a lot more often, and invited her over more often, too, though he teased her about it being only for her cooking. He’d taken her out to dinner on one or two occasions, as well, to small and family-owned restaurants that seemed to know him well enough that she suspected he was a regular. That had been...unexpected.

In fact, a lot about him was unexpected, the more glimpses of what was underneath his act she saw. He was a man of simple tastes, enjoying street food and his small apartment more than anyone else in his position would. He had a massive sweet tooth, and enjoyed his coffee almost drowned out by sugar, milk, and flavored syrup. He liked to read, and he liked to nap almost more than that -- and he could nap _anywhere_. He had a thing for chocobos, too, she’d noticed. He was incredibly sarcastic and hardly serious, but very insightful and clever, good at riddle and logic puzzles. And -- something she didn’t think he knew she noticed, because she felt like if he had he’d try to hide it better -- he was tired. Tired and sad, and tried to make sure no one saw.

She’d tried to pretend she hadn’t grown fond of him, but that was...hard. Though it was made a lot easier by the fact that she knew full well he didn’t feel close to the same about her. To him she was a friend, that was it. Nothing more. And besides, she was just a scientist, a nobody. He was the Chancellor. It was like a king and a commoner -- not about to happen. So as with all things in her life, she accepted that it was an impossible pipe dream, and put it upon the shelf, content to enjoy her friendship.

Though today, she couldn’t help but notice that the Chancellor was looking at her oddly. Like…oh, dear. “Chancellor,” she began. “What are you plotting? I already told you I can’t get involved in your mischief, because unlike you I _can_ get fired.”

“Oh, don’t worry,” he said with a smile that made her worry more. “It’s not anything like that -- _this_ time, anyway. You see, the Emperor is hosting a holiday gala at the end of the month for the end-of-year festivities. I suppose he feels the need to lighten the mood of the populace or what have you, though only a select few are invited. Including, unfortunately, yours truly.”

Carina muffled a snort of laughter. “Oh, how _terrible_ ,” she teased. “You have to go to a fancy party and eat nice food and -- gods forbid -- talk to people you don’t like for a few hours. But what do I have to do with this?”

“Well,” the Chancellor said, grinning almost wolfishly, and she could feel a shiver run down her spine. “As with all formal events, invitees are allowed to bring a guest. In this particular situation, I find myself with someone to ask along for once. Think of it this way -- we’ll be able to keep each other company in lieu of dealing with the people neither of us are fond of, _and_ you’ll get to try some of that nice food.”

Carina had gone very quiet, eyes wide, during his words. No, he couldn’t be-- he wasn’t-- oh, god, oh Astrals, oh heavens above, he _was!_ He had actually invited her to the gala! “Oh my god,” she managed after a moment. “Chancellor, I don’t even have a dress! I-I’ve never been to a formal-- are you sure?!”

“Very,” he said, patting her cheek companionably. “You’re one of the very few people here I tolerate, dear Carina, so I’d be honored to spend an otherwise _terribly_ dreary night with you. A friend.”

She managed a weak laugh. “If you think you can butter me up with compliments, then it’s working,” she told him. “But even if I do go with you, I still don’t have a dress.”

“We can fix that,” he said brightly, rummaging in the many pockets of his coat before retrieving his wallet. “Here,” he told her, pulling a credit card out. “Since I’m the one dragging you to this affair, your wardrobe is on me.”

“Oh my god, Chancellor, you can’t just give me your--” She took it anyway, looking bemused. “I guess you can,” she said. “You’re that important, I suppose. Thank you.”

He just waved a hand. “Don’t mention it. Really, don’t, you know how gossip gets. Just show up at the party and look mysterious, and they’ll have enough fun with that.”

“So I’m your Cinders Girl, then?” She teased. “I hope I don’t have to leave before midnight.”

The chancellor laughed, shaking his head. “You could, really, if you wanted to look even more mysterious, but please don’t. I’d rather not be stuck alone with all those _boring_ people.”

“In that case I won’t,” she replied. “I’ll be at your side ‘til the party’s over. We can drink champagne and gossip about ugly dresses, or whatever the cool people do at things like this.”

“That sounds rather accurate,” he said with a grin. “I can tell you all the terrible stories I know about all these awful people. I know _all_ the fun secrets~”

“I’m sure you do,” she told him. “Now shoo. I have a lot to finish if I have to go shopping before the weekend. I’ll see you the night of the party.”

* * *

Dress shopping was horrendous, Carina decided after three hours. She’d never done this before! She had no idea what she was doing, and this was miserable. If her mother were here, this might have been faster, but she wasn’t, so...gods. What did she even look good in!? She knew she liked green, but...that was it. There were dozens of green dresses at the least, and... _god_.

She groaned and flopped on one of the seats by the dressing room, looking dejected. “Ugh,” she muttered, head in hands. “This is _impossible_.”

“What is?” Someone asked, and she glanced up. Another woman stood next to her, her blond hair in a loose bun and dressed in rather nice clothes. “Looking for a dress, are you?”

“Mm,” Carina agreed. “Going to a party this weekend, but...I’ve never been to a party before. Like, ever. So I...really don’t have any idea what I’m doing.”

The woman grinned. “Oooh,” she said, and then leaned in. “The holiday gala at the Imperial palace?” She asked quietly, and then grinned wider when Carina nodded. “Same here. I’m just looking for some new heels, since my old ones broke the other day, but if you need a little help, I’ve got you covered. Fashion’s a hobby of mine.”

“Really?” Carina asked, looking relieved. “Oh my god, _thank_ you.”

The next hour and a half went by a lot quicker, thanks to her new friend, and it wasn’t very long until a dress was draped on a hanger beside Carina as she and the woman tried on shoes. Heels weren’t really Carina’s thing, but it was only for a night -- and some of the shoes had very small heels. Those should be okay, right?

“So,” the woman asked, testing her foot in a pair of strappy gold sandals. “I don’t think you’re one of the invitees - no offence, love -- so that means you’re a lucky man’s plus one. Your boyfriend?”

Carina turned crimson and sputtered a little. “N-No!” She managed. “He’s not-- we’re friends,” she tried to explain. “He’s-- he’s my only friend, really. He invited me for good company, that’s all.”

“Ah, a _friend-date_ ,” she said teasingly. “But I know that look. I’ve been around the block a few times-- that’s the look of unrequited affection. You’re fond of him as a little more than a friend, aren’t you?”

Carina sputtered a little more, before sighing, letting her head droop. “Mm,” she admitted. “Maybe? I...I think. I’ve never really…” She sighed. “But I am fond of him. Very fond. Sometimes I think I know him better than anyone else, and what I’ve seen of him is...I know he doesn’t show many other people that side of him. Even if he doesn’t...”

“Aw,” the woman said. “You’re happy just being his friend, because you can tell he needs one, right? And even if he doesn’t feel the same -- and you think he doesn’t -- that’s fine?” Carina looked startled, but the woman shook her head. “I told you, I’ve been around the block. I’ve seen it all before. The worst kind of unrequited love, if you ask me -- the kind that’s given without any kind of hope that it’ll ever be returned, and a meek acceptance of that fact.”

Carina opened her mouth to protest, but then closed it -- she knew that was true. “Everything else in my life is that kind of impossible dream anyway,” she muttered finally. “Why not this, too?”

“It’s only impossible if you think it is,” the woman told her. “So how about this -- where do you live, dear?”

“Um-- employee housing at the base,” Carina said awkwardly, startled. The woman nodded.

“Tell me where exactly and I’ll meet you there before the gala. I’ll bring my makeup kit and something for your hair, and we’ll pretty you up like a princess -- knock that man off his feet, dear. You won’t know if it’s impossible or not if you don’t try. And you should at _least_ try. That way, even if it _doesn’t_ work out, you’ll know for sure instead of just assuming the worst.”

Carina blinked, and then smiled faintly. “Okay,” she said. “I’ll at least try.”

What could it hurt, right? The woman had a point. It was what she was doing with her research, wasn’t it? Trying despite what anyone else said. So even if the Chancellor thought of her as a friend and nothing more...she wouldn’t know that for sure if she didn’t try. She was a scientist, after all, right? Nothing was proven until a hypothesis was _tested_.

So...perhaps she’d test it. Just this once, just for a night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> did i mention this was entirely written for self-indulgent purposes yet? because if you notice me checking off every Cute Romance Trope on the list, it's on purpose and fight me.
> 
> party party party what could possibly go wrong
> 
> also shout-out to my friend rex and her oc elena, who i borrowed for the cool lady that helped poor carina out.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which there is a party, and both parties involved are getting into some serious denial.

Ardyn hated parties -- hated them with a passion. He hadn’t used to, really, but after all this time...they held none of their former allure. They were crowded and loud, too full of people he didn’t know or didn’t like. Rich people gossiping about stupid things, showing off their gil, basking in their status as the elite few of the Empire, their military might and their few noble families. And of course, what always made it worse was that their annexed countries’ leaders were invited as well. A night spent in the same room as the Accordan elite was just annoying (even if he pitied them their hand; they were forced into this charade, paraded about like pets) -- but a night spent in the same room as the Oracle and her brother? _Insufferably_ bad.

Dear Ravus was one thing -- the Commander was easy to tease, one of the few he sought out on these occasions just to pester him for a while to ease the frustration and boredom -- but his little sister? He avoided her like the plague -- ha. Irony in that, wasn’t there? He _was_ the plague. He couldn’t stand to be near the Oracle, and not only because he knew she’d see right through him to the blackness at his core. Her white dresses, her blonde hair, her blue eyes -- he couldn’t look at a Fleuret woman and not see _her_ , lost millennia ago. And that was too much to bear, even though the pain had long since numbed. 

But tonight would be different -- tonight he’d have company, company that was there just for _him_. 

He couldn’t pretend it was all selfish desire for companionship that kept the scientist around anymore -- he did genuinely like her. She was a good soul, and that was exceedingly rare in the halls of Zegnautus. Her years in the Empire hadn’t crushed her spirit and drained her kindness. What they _had_ done was wear her nerves raw and tear down her opinion of herself, though, and he thought that was a crime. The latter, at least. She had a brilliant mind, and her work was possibly one of the most important things being done in the labs of Niflheim. A vaccine; a _cure_. 

She was good company besides, too; her shyness hid a spine of steel and a sharp sense of humor, and she was fairly insightful. He wondered if Verstael knew that in trying to distract her from her work, he’d sent her to the exact person who would encourage it? Who would befriend her -- at first just to assuage his loneliness, but...hell, he did enjoy her company, and she enjoyed his (she knew him better than anyone did anymore). It had been so long since he’d had a friend. Centuries. 

It was stupid and foolish, he knew that. He was so close. He couldn’t afford a distraction, a weakness -- something for the gods to take away like all the other friends he’d had once. It was why he’d set out to kill his humanity long ago. So this wouldn’t happen. But humanity seemed a hard thing to kill when you walked among them...and here he was making the same mistake again.

With any luck, though, he’d be able to leave her behind in the end. A clean break, and she’d be none the worse for wear after the sun went away, and after it came back. He’d just be a fond memory for her, nothing more -- or better, she’d come to hate him. That would be best.

Even if the thought did sting.

But for now, they were friends, odd as it may seem, and tonight she was accompanying him to the holiday gala. He was looking forward to the faces on the crowd when he walked in with someone on his arm, the whispers and gossip that would ensue. Oh, how he loved the mystery that surrounded him, and this would make it that much better. And more importantly, he’d have someone to talk to. Someone to make the night bearable.

It was a rare occasion indeed when he had to dress up -- he preferred his usual clothing, both because he was fond of his style (even if he’d heard it described kindly as ‘high-class hobo’) and because the layers afforded him ample protection from the sun. It didn’t hurt him as it did most daemons, but it was still horrendously uncomfortable, and tended to give him a very nasty rash if he was exposed too long. But he still had formalwear in the back of his closet.

He always dressed in black -- most assumed it was just a matter of style, but some habits died hard and he would always be of royal blood. So black was his color of choice, and his formal suit matched that as well. Ink-black boots, pants, and a double-breasted jacket with navy satin lapels and silver buttons. His dress shirt was black, too, though the vest he wore with it was dark grey, and he wore a red ascot instead of a tie, a bright splash of color at his neck. And of course, he couldn’t forget his scarf, this one pale grey and draped around his shoulders; he always had a scarf on him, really. He tended to collect them.

As Carina lived on the base, he’d be meeting her there, and so he arrived alone, pausing at the threshold to the main connecting bridge between the base and the Imperial palace (since the two buildings were nearly one intertwined). They’d decided to rendezvous here, and enter the palace proper together, as it would be her first time. No need for the poor girl to get lost, after all, and half the point was that they should be seen together. 

She hadn’t shown him a picture of what she’d be wearing, even though he’d pestered her incessantly about it the last few days, so he had to admit he was curious. She’d always tended towards casual clothing, jeans and sweaters and dress shirts -- simple and cheap, she’d admitted. She didn’t tend to worry too much about clothing, as long as it wasn’t hideous or too expensive. That was also fairly endearing, he had to admit. She was like a little country mouse in this big steel city of magitek sometimes.

“Chancellor!” He heard her call, and he turned to face her with one of his usual charming smiles, only to pause, taken momentarily off-guard. Well, that was-- _unexpected_.

She cleaned up nicely, he had to admit. _Very_ nicely. Her dress was hunter green silk and sleeveless, with a dark green off-the-shoulder lace top layer that came to the ribbon at her waist. The skirt lay close to her figure before flaring out at the knee, and he could tell her shoes were about the lowest heel she probably could find. Someone (because he knew she couldn’t have done it herself) had done her makeup for her, though she still wore her glasses, and they’d also pulled her hair up in a loose bun held up with a silver clip. 

She smiled at him as she approached, and he returned the expression. “Well, look at _you_ ,” he said teasingly. “You’ll be the talk of the party, I’m sure. You look lovely, dear.”

Carina blushed. “Shush,” she told him. “But really, you look nice, too. I didn’t think you _owned_ any nice clothes.”

“I don’t dress like a very cold vagrant _all_ the time,” he replied, laughing when she did. Now that she was closer, he could see she wore a simple necklace as well, a white star sapphire on a thin silver chain. “Your pendant’s quite nice,” he noted.

“My-- oh,” she said, touching it. “It was my mother’s. I took it from her things after my parents died, and...well, it’s the first time I’ve had occasion to wear it, I suppose.”

There wasn’t really much to say to that, really, so he just nodded in acknowledgement, offering her his arm. She blinked at it in surprise, but then she took it with a grin, and the pair of them headed to the party.

Ardyn had been right -- he could practically see the second’s hush that fell across the room when the Imperial Chancellor entered the ballroom with a pretty young woman on his arm, and it was hard not to laugh. He’d treasure the looks of shock on several faces, really, and a glance at Carina told him that though she was nervous and clutching his arm, she was beginning to relax as she realized that being with him afforded her a measure of protection -- no one dared gossip about anyone with _Ardyn_. Much. 

The ballroom -- normally as austere as the rest of the palace -- was decked out for the party in bright finery from Accordo and filled with flowers from Tenebrae. Not even the food was native to the Empire, he noted, gaze trailing over the buffet tables piled high with Tenebraen and Accordan delicacies, waiters walking around with glasses of champagne and wine. Really, the only things the Empire exported these days in its eternal winter was war and bloodshed.

As they passed a display of flowers, Ardyn reached out to snap a red poppy from its stem, turning to tuck it into Carina’s hair. “There,” he said with some satisfaction. “Now we’re coordinated.”

“What-- oh!” She laughed. “So we are. If I’d known I might have worn red, but...I like the flower, I think.”

“It suits you,” Ardyn agreed. “You said you were Tenebraen by birth, yes? Flowers always look good on Tenebraens -- their gardens are famous, after all.”

“They are, aren’t they?” She asked. “My father would take me to see them when I was small. I haven’t seen them in years, though…”

“Perhaps you’ll get a chance to see them again one day,” Ardyn said absently -- he’d been distracted for a moment by a glimpse of the Oracle across the room, clad in white as always, and he’d had to look away before their eyes met. But he found that he’d been genuine in his statement to her, and he pressed the point. “I wouldn’t write it off as impossible.”

Carina looked a bit startled, but then she smiled at him, wide and warm, and-- and hell, it was impossible, but he swore for a moment something in his chest softened. _No_ , he told himself quietly and firmly. _Don’t even think about it._ That wasn’t going to happen. It couldn’t happen; he’s incapable of that, he’s-- well, if he didn’t think about it, it wasn’t in question, so he pushed it out of his head.

Just because he was starved of affection did not in the least mean that he’d let anyone in like that, even if she _was_ intelligent, funny, and kind, even if she seemed to be one of the few Imperials who still gave a damn, even if she was the first bright star in the endless darkness of his life in... _centuries_. (Even if she inspired him to poetics, apparently. _Ugh._ )

“Come on,” Carina said, tugging his arm and distracting him from unwelcome thoughts. “I want to see the buffet you’ve been hyping up.” 

He laughed, letting her lead him through the edges of the crowd towards the buffet tables. “Don’t eat too much, now,” he teased her. “Don’t you know you’re only supposed to nibble like a particularly slow rabbit at these parties?”

Carina covered her mouth to keep an undignified snort in. “You really don’t like this kind of thing,” she said, amused. “I have a feeling this is going to be a very entertaining night.”

“Possibly,” he said with a crooked smile. “I do so enjoy having someone to commentate to.”

She returned the smile as they reached the buffet, and then her expression turned to awe as she took in the display of platters and trays of food. It was almost all Accordan and Tenebraen cuisine, and almost anything one could think of. Accordan platters of cured garula and cheeses of all colors and types, seafood -- shrimp, oysters, chunks of crab or lobster drenched in butter, fish carpaccio -- little slices of bread with tomatoes or cheese or caviar on them, all sorts of little bite-sized canapes and the like, all sorts of bread and crackers with all sorts of savory toppings.

And then the _desserts_ \-- Ardyn’s personal favorite part, and where he gravitated to almost immediately. Accordan cannolis, candied chestnuts, little marizipan sweets shaped like animals and monsters and flowers, little sweet gelatin cakes covered in caramel sauce or berries, dishes of creme brulee and mousse, piles upon piles of Tenebraen pastries and tarts, macarons of all flavors, dozens of different types of cakes...really, it was like a laundry list of the two annexed countries’ confections.

Despite his earlier joke, he happily filled a plate with as many sweets as he could fit on it and stepped away to await Carina, who joined him with the same a moment later. “I was thinking about getting something savory,” she told him, looking amused. “But then I saw the dessert table and decided...well, hey, why not? I mean, it’s a party. No one will complain if we have dessert first.”

“If it were up to me, I think I would have dessert first, last, and only,” Ardyn said with a laugh, taking a bite of one of the pastries on his plate. “My favorite course, of course.”

Carina giggled, picking up a marzipan coeurl and turning it in her hand. “It’s almost too cute to eat,” she said, but then bit off its head with a bit of relish. “ _Almost_.”

Ardyn laughed, covering his mouth to hide his amusement. “That poor coeurl,” he said, shaking his head in mock pity, before picking up a marzipan cactuar and popping it into his mouths. “We’re monsters, both of us.”

The pair of them laughed again, and cleaned their plates off methodically. Despite it all being little portions, it was a lot of food -- and good, too. “I don’t think I’ve ever had anything this good,” Carina noted, placing her plate on one of the little tables around the edge of the room. “You should invite me to parties more often.”

Ardyn smiled. “I think I just might,” he admitted. “It’s nice to have company.”

The response -- a laugh and another smile -- made that stupid traitorous thing in his chest soften again, and he let out a breath, glancing around the room again just to distract himself. He looked back at her, pausing for a moment and (despite inwardly protesting) reached out to wipe a bit of frosting off the corner of her lips. He licked the frosting off his thumb almost automatically, and then mentally kicked himself. Now she was blushing, and now it was awkward, and if he could strangle himself right now, he probably would. Just on principle, though, since it wouldn’t actually kill him.

Alright, time for a distraction -- albeit a badly thought-out one. “Come on,” he said, taking her hand (another bad idea) and leading her into the middle of the room to where the dance floor was. They didn’t have live musicians -- why bother when modern technology meant that they could simply pipe music through speakers? -- but even so, people were still dancing. That was another thing that never changed about parties. Food, drinking, and dancing -- always the same three things, no matter the window dressings. “You should have at least one dance tonight.”

“Oh,” Carina managed, still blushing. “A dance-- oh! Okay. I...don’t know how to dance, though.”

“Just follow my lead, then,” he said with a smile, turning to take her hands in his and place them where they were meant to be, waist and shoulder. This was one of the things no one ever expected him to know, really -- but two thousand years gave him the opportunity to learn quite a bit. And besides that, he’d been royalty once, in another life. You kind of _had_ to know how to dance properly back then.

One song ended and another began, another slow song, and so they danced. With this close proximity it was hard not to look down at her, and hard not to meet her eyes. He could feel her heartbeat against his chest, and he had to almost wonder if she could feel his; if it felt different from a human’s. Whatever the case, they were like this, and part of Ardyn wanted to pull away, but part of him... _didn’t_. And that was probably the worst thing. That part of him didn’t. He really, _really_ couldn’t afford this. This was stupid and wrong, and... _damn_ it. He can’t do this. He shouldn’t do this. 

_God_ , he was selfish, he reflected bitterly as he did not pull away. So stupidly selfish. 

The song ended and they both stood there for a long moment, awkward and quiet -- a frozen moment in time where neither of them was at all sure what to do next.

Ardyn made the first move after that, sliding his arm through hers and moving off the dance floor, snatching two wine glasses from a passing tray and handing Carina one of them. “Drinking and gossip?” He suggested, and Carina managed a laugh, face still a little flushed from the moment Ardyn decided to pretend hadn’t happened. He didn’t want it to have happened. He wasn’t supposed to _feel_ anything anymore, damn it. He had worked hard to cut himself off from humanity, stand outside and apart as he orchestrated his plans. Caring for no one, nothing, because why should a monster have attachments? But here he was, having soft and human feelings towards this girl.

Well, when all else failed...it was time to drink until he forgot about those stupid feelings. Thank god for an inhuman alcohol tolerance and an inability to die of alcohol poisoning.

As the two of them drank their wine -- and eventually something stronger, as Ardyn cheerfully commandeered a bottle of Tenebraen blackberry liqueur from the bar -- they talked, gossiping about the other people at the party. The Imperial nobles in their almost-armored finery, noses turned up and arrogant to the extreme, the conquerors and their peacock displays. The Accordans were much more sedate in comparison, but even then Ardyn knew all the little morsels of scandal. That one was slipping money to rebel factions, this one was sleeping with at least two Imperial officers...it was almost funny. He hadn’t used to appreciate gossip, but after all this time, he’d learned to use it as a weapon almost as deadly as anything in his Armiger’s arsenal. But at times it wasn’t a weapon -- at times it was just _funny_.

The only two he didn’t talk about, really, were the Fleurets -- he avoided that subject entirely, as much for his own questionable sanity as for their dignity. Nothing he wanted to say about them, about _her_. 

A few hours later, he stopped mid-sentence upon noticing a weight on his side. He looked down, and then couldn’t help the smile. “Tired, are we?” He asked Carina, who had slumped drowsily against him. 

She blinked up at him, her face pink from the alcohol and eyes hazy. “Uh-huh,” she said, stifling a yawn. “Not good a’...liquor stuff.”

“I can see that,” he replied, laughing. “Come on, then, I think the party’s over for us.” He took her by the arm and led her out of the ballroom, back to the base. “Where’s your room?”

Carina yawned again. “Mm...employee housin’s...sou’west wing,” she answered sleepily, her voice slurring. “M’on the fourth floor, um…’partment four-two-one.”

“Four twenty-one, southwest wing,” he repeated. “Right, then.” That said, he scooped her into his arms, causing her to yelp and throw her arms around his neck and bury her face in his shoulder.

“Chans’ler!” She whined, her voice muffled. “What’re you doin’?”

He laughed. “Carrying you to your room, obviously,” he said, despite knowing he'd regret it later once he was alone with his bad leg. “I have a feeling you won’t make it there on your own.”

“Oh,” she said, and then yawned. “Mmkay.” She let her head drop back down onto his shoulder with a sigh, and he set off down the halls. With her quiet like this, half-asleep in his arms, he had time to think, and he didn’t...he didn’t like any of the answers his brain was supplying him with. 

He didn’t want to think about it. It was impossible, improbable, and entirely too foolish and stupid a concept. He didn’t have feelings at all, let alone for _her_. He was the Accursed, the betrayed king, the Scourge made flesh, meaning to tear the gods from their heaven and plunge the world into darkness only the Chosen King could end. None of that held room for softness and laughter and the smile this girl had for him. He’d lost it all too long ago to ever dare to search for something like that again, anyway.

She was asleep by the time he got to her room, so he fished his master keycard from his pocket and unlocked her door that way, carrying her in. it was very quaint, a two-room apartment with the kitchen and dining area separated from the living area and bed by a small partition, the only other doors leading to a bathroom and closet. Sparsely furnished, too, but cluttered with books and papers and this and that. Oddly homey, for a standard-issue employee housing apartment. He stepped around the small table in the living area and put her down on her bed with a groan, adjusting the blankets slightly and making sure she was comfortable.

He paused, still leaning over her, and reached out to brush some stray hair from her face, taking her glasses off and putting them on her bedside table. His hand returned to her face, absently running a thumb across her cheek, and he sighed.

“I'm an idiot,” he murmured. “A complete idiot.”

Why was he doing this to himself? To her? He sighed again and stepped away, only to pause when he felt a tug on his scarf. She'd grabbed it in her sleep, and was holding on tight. He watched her for a moment before pulling his scarf from his shoulders and letting it fall next to her. He had plenty; she could keep this one.

Another long moment of watching her and he finally stepped away, turning to go, but--

“Chans’ler…?” Carina mumbled, half-lidded eyes peering at him from where her face was tucked into his hijacked scarf. “Y’r limpin’ again…”

He smiled at her tiredly, letting his mask slip just for a moment -- she was too out of it to remember it. “An old wound,” he told her. “Nothing to worry yourself about, Carina...go to sleep.”

“Mmkay,” she mumbled, snuggling into the scarf further. He sighed at that -- only half-heartedly swearing in his head at the softening of the thing in his chest -- and left, letting the door shut behind him. 

God, he was stupid. He was going to have to do his best to end this…whatever it was before it began.

He _had_ to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ah yes, the NOPE NOT HAPPENING I REFUSE TO FALL IN LOVE denial stage of the relationship. have fun w that while it lasts, ardyn, my dear.
> 
> also carina is never giving you that scarf back btw.
> 
> (also i can't not make ardyn suffer a little bit bc that's how i roll)


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which there is a reveal, and they finally both give up on the whole 'denial' thing.

Carina, contrary to what Ardyn seemed to think, wasn't stupid. Or at least she was more aware than he gave her credit for. 

She could tell something was wrong; or at least that he was acting strange. It had been like this since the holiday party, the past month or so -- he'd been increasingly distant and distracted, finding excuses to spend less and less time with her. It wasn't too hard to figure out why, or part of the reason.

The scarf he'd left behind told a story -- there might be something there. Something more than a silly hopeful crush. More, maybe, on both sides. But...for some reason, he was pulling away. Was he scared? She couldn't imagine the Chancellor being scared of anything. 

Nonetheless, she wore the scarf as often as she could; which was often, considering how cold Gralea was. She loved it, the faint smell of coffee and caramel and _him_ that still lingered. Her feelings certainly hadn't changed since the party -- they'd gotten stronger, even. Not even the chancellor’s avoidance changed that.

On week five since the party, Minister Besithia gave her a folder and told her to hang onto it, as the Chancellor was away on a trip and wouldn't return for a few days. She took the folder and left it on her desk, and every day walked by his office just to check. Since he was avoiding her, that was the only way she'd know when he returned.

Six days later, he returned -- she was heading to his office when another researcher stopped her, telling her he'd seen the Chancellor arrive a few hours ago and that he seemed... _off_. A scary sort of off. He'd headed to his office and the scientist had heard the door slam shut from all the way down the hall. He warned her not to go, since he knew she was practically the chancellor's secretary -- he didn't look well.

Carina thanked him, agreeing, but turned and headed to the chancellor's office anyway as soon as she could. She wasn't afraid, and _someone_ had to see if he needed help. The man wasn't likely to admit it himself, given how she'd found his kitchen the first time she'd visited. For all she knew, he was heading into work while very sick or badly injured -- he knew no one would question him or look too closely, after all, and he had a spectacularly bad habit of ignoring his own well-being. But she knew him better than most, and she was no longer afraid of him.

She paused in front of the door, though, a little startled. The edges of the frame looked...wrong, somehow. Bent a little, as if someone had slammed against the frame -- but who would be strong enough to actually bend such thick metal? Had something happened?

“Chancellor?” She called cautiously, frowning when there was no answer. “Chancellor, I know you’re here...are you alright?” She rapped on the door with her knuckles, but again, no answer. “Chancellor!”

After getting no response again, she sighed in annoyance, reaching over to the keypad by the door and -- hoping he hadn’t changed it -- plugged in the code for the door, seeing as she didn’t have a keycard with a high enough clearance. “I’m coming in,” she said, letting the door slide open. 

It was then that she heard him, his voice strangely hoarse and wet. “Don’t-- stay _away_ , Carina,” he hissed, coughing, but that only made her hurry into the room, letting the door shut behind her. The office’s lights were all off, and she fumbled for the switch.

“I’m not going _anywhere_ ,” she told him irritably, her back turned as she hit the lights. “Something clearly happened to you, and if you’re hurt, I’m not going to just walk a--”

She turned then, when she heard him cry out, and her eyes widened. “Oh my god,” she managed, stepping back, a hand coming up to cover her mouth. “Chan-- Chancellor?”

He was on the floor of the office, a hand having come up to shield his face from the lights. But despite that, she could still see his face clearly. His face, mouth and eyes dripping tar-black ink. His clothes, disheveled and stained black as well, coat off and dropped to the side to reveal tattered clothing and a wound upon his side -- an animal bite, huge and terrible -- that had torn flesh and bone and muscle, pale skin stained with black blood, a wound she knew objectively should have killed him. _Should have._

They stared at each other for a moment, her dark brown eyes and his honey-colored ones meeting without knowing what to say. The whites were blackened as well, she noticed distractedly, making his eyes almost look golden.

There was silence, interrupted by the chancellor coughing, black blood dripping from between his fingers as he pressed his hand to his mouth, muffling the sound. That jolted Carina into action, though, still unable to think properly but needing to do _something_. She dug in her pocket for a spare pair of latex gloves, pulling them on as she rushed to his side. “What happened?” She asked, voice high and a little reedy, and she reached towards the wound only for him to smack her hand away.

“Don’t--” He hissed. “Don’t touch me, Carina, don’t you _dare_ touch me, I’m--”

She didn’t know why she reacted like she did -- or perhaps she did, the month of being pushed away finally getting to her -- but she slapped him across the face for that before he could finish. “Don’t _you_ dare start worrying about me after ignoring me for a month,” she told him sharply. “If you care, then _care_ , but _make up your damned mind first_. And besides, in case you’ve forgotten, I’m a daemonologist and I’ve been working with the Scourge for years. I know what I’m doing.”

She almost smiled when he gaped at her, shocked, but took the opportunity instead to inspect his wound, touching the edges of it gingerly and gasping when she watched the torn flesh and splintered bone knit itself back together. She hovered over it for a moment longer before turning back to his face, reaching out to wipe some of the liquid from his cheek and rubbing it between her fingers.

“You have the Scourge,” she said finally, quietly. “Late stage, too. You don’t see the ichor until stage three, at least. But-- stage three lasts a month at most, and...I’ve known you for almost two years. And you…” Something in the back of her head finally clicked, and she went pale. “Oh my god-- your chronic illness, that’s not-- _that’s_ the Scourge, too, isn’t it? The symptoms are-- the fever cycles, the chronic pain, the-- but then, you--” She shook her head, swallowing back more shocked fragments. “You’ve had it for _years_ ,” she managed. “The progression of symptoms...most people are dead in three months at most...”

“But not me,” the chancellor murmured, wiping at his face. “It won’t kill me. Nothing will, in point of fact.”

“I-I can see that,” Carina said quietly, eyes returning to the wound slowly knitting itself back together. “What happened?”

He was quiet for a long moment, before shrugging. “I was foolish. Didn’t watch where I walked, didn’t catch myself in time and ended up strolling into a sahagin nest. Not the worst thing that’s happened to me.”

“What was?” Carina asked before she could stop herself, then looked away in embarrassment. She heard him laugh, though, a sad and bitter sound, and then the rustle of cloth, and she turned back only to gasp. He’d taken his shirt and vests off, leaving his chest bare. His skin was pale, the veins beneath too dark to be normal, and across his arms and chest were pale scars, each one far too large for comfort, more than a few of them right above his heart. She reached out towards those, tracing them with a finger. “Oh,” she murmured, eyes flickering up to where there was a thin and pale smile traced in scar tissue across his throat. _“Oh…”_

“Mmm,” he murmured, moving her hand away -- more gently this time. “The only wounds that leave scars are the ones that should have killed me.”

Carina let out a breath, unable to look away now from the patchwork of scars, the black veins, the smear of inky blood she’d left over his heart. “How is this possible…?”

“I’m a monster,” he told her, and laughed, and Carina’s heart broke at the sound. “A very special daemon. I’m human in form, in mind and in body, maybe, but-- I’m not human. I’m a daemon. A monster, Carina dear. Always sick but never dying-- this is my true face, Carina.” He gestured at himself, dark ichor still dripping steadily from his blackened eyes and mouth. “This. I’m-- I’m nothing like who you think I am, nothing like anything anyone could guess. I’m not even _human_. I never have been, in all the time you’ve known me.”

Carina watched him for a moment, quiet, slowly trying to process what she’d just discovered, trying to put it together with all she’d already known. He wasn’t human...he was some kind of daemon, human in both appearance and in mind, but still a daemon. The symptoms of the Scourge still affected him, but never worse than the stage two symptoms unless...unless he was injured, and then they’d get worse and worse. But-- he couldn’t die, either, something else not at all like any other daemon. So he wasn’t...he was something else _entirely_.

Was that why he…?

“Is this why you avoided me?” She asked softly. “Because you didn’t want me to know this?”

He was quiet, but finally spoke after a moment that seemed to last an eternity. “Because I didn’t want you to _love me_ ,” he said, his voice almost inaudible. “I’m not human, Carina. I’m a monster. I’ve been alive longer than you can imagine, done things you don’t want to know about. I’m not-- I _shouldn’t_ \--” He laughed again, soft and sad and bitter. “Look at me. This is what I am. Something like this shouldn’t overstep its boundaries. It can play at being human, but in the end…”

“You look human to me,” Carina said finally. “You sound human. You think like a human. So what if you...you aren’t entirely human? If you have the Scourge like-- like this? You’re right, I can’t imagine what you’ve seen and done, and I don’t think I want to try, but...I do know _you_. I think I know you better than anyone else, because...you don’t let anyone close, and I guess now I know why.” She swallowed. “You’re funny, and you’ve been kind to me, and you live in a tiny little apartment and forget to buy groceries. You drink obscene amounts of sugary coffee and know every single hole in the wall restaurant in Gralea. You know how to dance, and I think you know a lot more things I’ve only begun to find out. You have a limp you hide incredibly well, and a very nice smile when it’s for real, and-- and you’re one of the saddest, loneliest people I’ve ever met.” 

She shook her head stubbornly. “So you’re sick. That’s not-- that isn’t-- I can find a cure. You _know_ that. You’ve been...you’ve been supporting me. And I’ll do it.” She reached out to take his hands in hers, and he let her. “I’ll _do it_ , and I’ll fix you. I’ll fix you, and it’ll be okay. I promise.”

“Carina…” He smiled, but it didn’t even reach his eyes and faded after a few moments. “Even knowing what I am, even after I tried to--” A weak laugh. “You’re too kind. I don’t deserve this.”

“It’s not about what you think you deserve,” Carina said, reaching up to wipe at his face. “It’s about how I feel about you, regardless of anything else. Maybe I’m an idiot, but-- everything you’ve done for me, the months we’ve been friends, everything we’ve…” She trailed off, letting her hand linger. “Maybe I’m an idiot, maybe it’s too easy and too fast -- I know I’m naive, and completely clueless about this kind of thing, but...” 

She fell silent, and stared at the hand that still held the chancellor’s -- _Ardyn’s_ , she needed to call him Ardyn -- though peering up through her bangs showed her that the man was staring at her with wide eyes, almost as if pleading for her not to say what they both knew what she was about to say.

“But...I love you,” she said finally, her voice small with the weight of those four words. She’d been thinking about it a lot since the party, and saying it aloud...it sounded right. “I love you, Ardyn.” Yes, it sounded right. 

There was a long silence again, and she tensed, but when Ardyn spoke again his own voice was small, almost desperate in his confusion. “Why?” He asked. “You know what I am. You know better than anyone. You love _this?_ You want _this?”_ His voice rose somewhat, almost angry, but Carina looked up at his face, twisted with emotion, and didn’t flinch. “You think you’d be _happy_ , loving a monster? You think this will have a happy ending? You think-- do you really think--” His voice broke. “Do you really-- do you _still_ want _me?”_

“I know,” she said. “I know this won’t end well. But that’s okay.” She gave his hand a little squeeze. “It gives me something to fight for. And-- I’ve never really...as long as I have you today, I don’t mind not knowing what tomorrow brings. One day at a time is good enough.” She laughed quietly. “And besides. I’m a daemonologist. This...doesn’t bother me.” Perhaps it should, but it doesn't.

He stared at her a moment, before laughing -- a real one this time, albeit a little shaky. “How in the hell did my luck change enough to bring you to me?” He asked, shaking his head. “The gods must not be paying attention...nothing good ever happens when they are. And yet here _you_ are, you brilliant lunatic of a woman.” He swallowed, wiping at his face, and she was surprised to see the black streaks fade and vanish, his eyes returning to normal. 

“I tried--” He began. “I didn’t want this. For...for a great many reasons. When I realized what was happening, I did my best to stop it, but…” His voice softened, and he leaned in closer to her. “Seems it was too late for either of us. This is going to end terribly and in tears, and I _am_ sorry for that, but if it’s what you really want…” He sighed, smiling again. “Then I suppose we can both be selfish together, and hoard our happiness until it’s gone.”

That said, he closed the distance between them, kissing her gently. His free hand reached to support her head and neck, pulling her closer. She gasped into his mouth, but then melted into his touch, a hand coming up to catch herself on his chest. He broke the kiss eventually, letting his forehead rest against hers, and sighed, both of his hands moving to catch her in a hug. She let him, her head resting on his shoulder, and they both sat there like that for a long moment. 

“I don’t mind being selfish, Ardyn,” Carina said finally. “I want this. _You_. Just this once, I...want something for _me_.”

“I understand that,” Ardyn murmured. “It’s about damn time the universe let me have a little happiness, so...I’ll take it.”

They’ll both take it, Carina reflected, closing her eyes and listening to Ardyn breathe. It wouldn’t end well, that much she knew, but...she wanted this, more than anything. And if he did too, then...let them have this while they could. It was better than never having it at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ship sail ship sail ship sail 
> 
> and ardyn is an idiot but we all make mistakes and trip into giant amphibious alligatorfish sometimes, right? 
> 
> also carina is a very brave young lady, but she's also pretty pragmatic. and they're both basically like 'well this is going to end horribly but hey we can be happy for a little bit'; ah i love crapsack worlds.
> 
> (more bullshitting re: scourge science, wheeeee)


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which something happens at the lab, and we learn a little more about carina

Ardyn...well, the past three months had been interesting. He wouldn’t say he was happy-- that was pushing it too far -- but he was... _content_. Which in and of itself was far more than he’d been in centuries at the very least. 

It was still new, this... _thing_ with Carina, still in the fledgling stages. Both of them were new at this -- well, she was. He just hadn’t been in a relationship in two thousand years, that was all. They were both still fumbling a little, trying to find footing and figure things out. What they wanted, what they needed. Ardyn certainly didn’t know. He just knew that this was a terrible idea, and though he was being selfish, he didn’t mind too much. It was...nice.

She spent half her nights at his apartment, lately, either making them dinner or letting him order out, and they’d fall asleep together -- the first time he’d shared his bed with anyone in a long time, and god, he hadn’t realized how much he missed having someone beside him, warm and soft, someone’s deep, peaceful breathing reassuring him that he wasn’t alone. Waking up beside someone, watching the dawn’s light shine through the shades onto her face. She wasn’t _beautiful_ objectively speaking, only plainly pretty, but...that didn’t matter. When you cared about someone they were the most beautiful person in the world.

They hadn’t slept together -- and by a mutual agreement they never would, which was probably for the best. Carina was inexperienced, and didn’t mind a sexless relationship; something that was entirely necessary, given that Ardyn didn’t know if the Scourge would pass on through that, and didn’t want to find out. But they slept beside one another, Carina curled up in Ardyn’s arms, and Ardyn…

He hadn’t realized just how starved for touch he’d been until now, and even if this was all still new, he couldn’t get enough of her presence, her closeness. She’d had to chase him out of the kitchen on several occasions, just because he wouldn’t give her room to cook -- he didn’t want to leave her side when she was nearby, wanted to be able to reach out and touch her hand, her arm, run a hand through her hair.

It was almost pathetic how quickly he’d reverted to how he had once been in regards to romance -- an addict of affection, with a constant need to be near her, to touch her. He had a feeling he was rubbing off on her, too, as she tended to gravitate towards him as well as often as she could, like they were a pair of magnets.

Really, it was a slow migration of Carina’s things into his apartment, and slowly it began to look more _lived_ in. Her books joined his on the shelves, her clothes joined his in the closet, food was in the fridge and pantries, bottles of peach-scented shampoo joining his on the bathroom counter. It looked like someone really lived there now, not simply...used the place to sleep. One of many things changing since he and Carina started...whatever this was.

It was one of his bad spells, so she had made him comfortable in bed and left lunch in the fridge before heading off to the lab -- something so horrifically domestic it almost made him cry. This isn’t something he deserved or something he should have, so close to the end of it all, the beginning of his plans. But he has it, and god, he knows it won’t last. Why let himself be happy when he knows it will be gone soon?

But he was selfish and a hypocrite, he knew this, so...he might as well enjoy it. After having that argument with himself for what had to be the hundredth time in the past three months, he’d rolled over and fallen back asleep, letting the medication he’d taken knock him out for a while.

He was woken up by the sound of the door slamming, and he hauled himself drowsily out of bed to peer out the bedroom door -- he’d given Carina a copy of his door key a while ago, so he knew it was her, though he wasn’t sure why she’d slammed the door. Had something happened? (His next thought was a knee-jerk _‘who am I going to have to kill’_ , which really said a lot about how much he had come to care, didn’t it?)

“Carina?” He called, puzzled, raking some slightly damp hair out of his face. There was silence for a moment before he saw her, and there was no mistaking by the look on her face that something was terribly wrong. She took one look at him and threw herself at him, burying her face in his chest and -- oh, god -- starting to _cry_.

Whatever remained of his heart melted at that, and he gently pulled her into his arms, lowering them both to the ground. “Shhh, dear,” he said. “Shhh. Everything is alright. It’s alright. I’m here.” Watching her, he doesn’t think this was anything someone had done -- he’d seen enough tears to tell them apart, and this was near-hysterics, the shaking sobs of someone reliving something terrible. “What happened?”

She couldn’t speak through her tears, so he didn’t push, just held her. It was strange to do this; he hadn’t been one to go to for comfort, not in a long time, but...he still somehow knew what to do. A tuneless hum, something soothing, rubbing her back until she could breathe again...it was instinct, old memories still there even if he hadn’t needed them in ages.

“Carina,” he repeated when she’d calmed down. “What _happened?_ Talk to me.”

She took a deep, gasping breath, shaking her head and trying to speak. “I--” She tried. “One of the other researchers, he-- he was sick, he didn’t tell anyone, he collapsed in his lab--” Her voice broke and she buried her face in Ardyn’s chest again. “They know I’m the daemonologist, s-so they called me in, but-- but it was too late...”

“He turned?” Ardyn asked, grimacing. “That’s...I’m sorry you had to see that. It’s never pleasant…was anyone injured?”

Carina shook her head, not looking up. “They’d also called in some MTs,” she murmured. “When he-- when he turned, they-- it was over fast.”

“Well, that’s something, at least,” Ardyn said, more to himself than her. “That isn’t why you’re upset, is it, though?”

Carina laughed a little weakly, “N-No,” she admitted. “It’s not-- that’s not it. I-I mean, I’ve seen daemons die before, it’s not...I’m not that…” She swallowed, shifting closer to him and finally looking up, her glasses a little foggy from the tears she’d shed. “It’s…” She trailed off, and Ardyn absently reached up to tug her hair tie loose, running his fingers through her hair. She let out a soft sigh and relaxed into his arms, tucking herself into his lap. 

“It’s my parents,” she murmured finally. “They got sick when I was little, a-and no one would help them...I was all alone, and I couldn’t...I tried everything, but I didn’t know what was going on. I was only ten.” She swallowed. “One night I heard a noise, and when I tried to check on them, they were--” Her voice shook. “They had--” She broke off, biting her lip, and couldn’t continue, but she didn’t need to.

“You watched your parents turn,” Ardyn said quietly, and Carina nodded. 

“I-I don’t remember much after that,” she told him. “B-but then Imperial guards came and took me from the house, told me what happened, brought me to an orphanage…lived there until I was old enough to go to the Academy. It’s why I…”

She trailed off again, but again, there was no need for her to continue. It all made sense now. Why she was so set on a vaccine and a cure, why she was so driven and passionate about it. He understood that all too well, painfully so -- memories that would never go away.

“When I was a child,” he began slowly, almost hesitantly. “I witnessed the beginnings of the Scourge, before it even had a name.” She knew by now how old he was, though she still had no idea of who he truly was -- one day he’d have to tell her, but that wasn’t today. “I saw people I knew, friends, turn before my eyes, before I even knew what was happening to them. It was…” It was his turn for his voice to crack. “Not something I will ever forget, so long as I live. It has always been a horrific thing to witness. It has always been a horrific thing to _suffer_ , both for those sick and those who have to watch their loved ones waste away.”

It had been why he’d tried to fix it -- the same reason she had. He had been unable to bear the thought of it taking more people, unable to bear the thought of more people suffering, seeing what he’d had to see. There were other reasons, too, but-- that had been what started it.

“Oh,” Carina whispered, looking up at him again and kissing him suddenly, wrapping her arms around his neck and resting her head on his shoulder. “And now _you’re_ sick,” she said. “Does it scare you?”

He was quiet for a moment. “Yes,” he admitted finally. “I try not to think about it most of the time, but...it does frighten me, at times. That I’ll one day lose what little humanity I have left. As a child, daemons used to terrify me, and now that I am one of them...for a long time I didn’t know what to think of myself. That other daemons don’t attack me is a small blessing, but...it’s not worth it.”

“I can’t imagine it would be,” Carina said quietly, letting her fingers tangle loosely in his hair. “I’ll fix it one day, I promise. Before anything happens. For my parents, for everyone you knew -- for _you_ , Ardyn. I’ll find a way to fix it. Without the help of the gods or whatever their prophecies say.”

Ardyn managed a smile, kissing her temple. “The gods can’t be relied upon for anything,” he said absently. “But you, I trust. I know you’ll do your best, my dear.”

Maybe not before it all ended, maybe not something that could fix _him_ , but...she’d find a way to help people without the gods, without making the same mistake he had. He knew she would.

And that’s...that was why he loved her. Damn it, he hadn’t wanted to even think that word, but it was there now, and undeniable.

He loved her. He kissed her temple again, letting his own head rest against hers. He wasn’t going to argue with his emotions right now. There was time for beating himself up later. Right now...he would enjoy this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> carina's story is :( but it makes her work make a lot of sense -- and in turn, ardyn's trauma makes his own healing thing make sense. ;v; seeing shit like that as child is gonna fuck with you up. poor kids.
> 
> cutes tho, cutes. sad-cutes, but cutes all the same.
> 
> and they're Domestic Partners now, yayyyy!! sharing an apartment, how adorable. and no there is no sex in this fic, no plaguesex tbh.


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which carina decides to raid ardyn's bookcase, and we learn a little bit more about him.

Carina couldn’t remember a time when she had been this happy. Not since when she was a little girl, at the very least, not since her before parents had died. She knew that this happiness wasn’t meant to last forever and most likely wouldn’t, but she still held onto it with both hands. It was more than she’d ever expected from life, more than she’d ever dreamed of.

Ardyn was-- he wasn’t like she’d ever imagined. He was sweet, he was kind, he hardly wanted to leave her side when they were together; it was like this relationship had brought out a side of him that had been long buried. Something gentle and soft and human, despite how he’d professed repeatedly that he wasn’t, or that he didn’t _feel_ human.

She thought he was; maybe not a human like her or anyone else, with the Scourge infecting him and keeping in some kind of...limbo state, but human enough. And she loved him anyway, no matter what he thought. She’d fallen for him months ago, but in the time since they’d started their relationship, those feelings had just grown deeper and stronger. Sometimes she would wake up before him -- most days she did, really -- and lie beside him and watch him sleep. His eyes were closed, the lines of exhaustion on his face eased in slumber, and her heart would swell with how much she loved him.

She’d ended up pretty much moving into his apartment -- he’d made her a spare key, and her things had migrated over. The place was lived in now, homey, and she sometimes wondered if she could bring up getting a pet. But only sometimes; she didn’t think he’d like the idea, and some things were...she felt like they were off limits. As much as they loved each other, some things crossed a line.

There had been a huge staff meeting that day for the researchers, so they’d been shooed home early -- Carina usually never got home before Ardyn, strangely enough. Even though he was far higher in the chain of command than her, he had less to do, and she stayed ‘til midnight at least on most days. Ardyn had been trying to get her to stop that, but it was hard for her to not, especially knowing what her lover suffered from.

Today though, she was home first, and after making dinner early (so she could just heat it up when he got home; laziness was a bad habit on both their parts, and neither of them were very big on doing too much around the house) she went through the bookshelves to pick something out to read. Her books were there, of course, but so were his, and she had never had time before to investigate his selection.

She paused on a title, a series of ten smallish books tucked into one side of a shelf, and blinked in surprise. “Huh,” she murmured. “These are kids’ books...I wonder why he has them.” _The Grand Adventures of Prince Rex,_ the spines read -- she remembered these books very well. She’d just been born when the series started being published, and she’d read them growing up. The first series had ended when she was eleven or so, and then a trilogy, the second series, had come out over the next five years. They’d been some of the first books she’d read, honestly. Her mother had read her some of them when she was little, and then she’d read them herself. Repeatedly, in fact. 

They’d been one of her favorite series, and she knew she was far from the only one. They hadn’t been as popular in the Empire, but she knew in Lucis and Tenebrae they were incredibly popular. She’d seen how big the fandom was online, and on more than one occasion had been tempted to buy memorabilia from online stores in Lucis.

That Ardyn had them, as old as he really was...was a bit surprising. Wasn’t he too old to have ever read kids’ books? Huh.

It had been years since she’d read them, though, so she pulled the books from the shelf in a stack and brought them to the couch, heading to the kitchen to make a mug of tea before returning to the couch, curling up beneath a blanket, and starting to read.

She’d gotten to the fourth book by the time Ardyn got home that night -- she was a fairly fast reader, and they were written for kids and preteens, after all -- and didn’t even notice he’d gotten home until he leaned over the couch to kiss her temple. “So I see I’ve been forgotten in favor of a book,” he said teasingly when she jumped and looked up at him. “I’m jealous.”

“Oh, shush,” she told him with a laugh, kissing his nose. “I was distracted, that’s all. I haven’t read these books in ages.” 

He looked surprised, reaching over the couch to pick up the first book, which sat on her legs with the other two she’d finished, and then smiling. “Prince Rex,” he said fondly. “You read these as a child?”

“Of course I did,” she replied. “My mother would read them to me, and then I read them myself when I was a little older. They were one of my favorite series.” She glanced down at the book in her lap. “I was always sad the author never got around to that third story arc.”

Ardyn came around to perch on the side of the couch, still holding the first book. “I suppose life got in the way,” he said, though there was an odd, fondly amused note in his voice that made her take note. “Who was your favorite?”

“Oh, um...hm,” Carina frowned in thought. “I liked Sunny,” she began. “He was sweet. And Sage I liked because he was the one with the most common sense, but I think Rex was my favorite. Though Vesper was pretty great, even if he was only really in the second arc.”

“I liked Vesper, too,” Ardyn said, turning the book over in his hands absently. “I never really expected things in the trilogy to go the way they did, but it got a bit out of hand. But then, those tend to be the best kind of stories.”

She laughed, but then stopped, her eyes widening as she sat forward. “What--?” She asked, and she could see him stop and realize what he’d said, his own eyes widening before he winced visibly. “Ardyn, did you-- did _you_ write these?”

He was silent for a moment, before he sighed. “Yes,” he admitted. “Under a pen name, obviously, but yes. I wrote the Rex books.”

“That’s why no one’s ever met him!” Carina gasped, before laughing and putting the fourth book aside to tackle Ardyn in a hug. “Oh god, thank you so much, they were amazing books! I can’t believe you wrote-- they’re amazing, Ardyn, you’re an incredible writer!”

He turned red, which she thought was the sweetest thing. “I-- well, _objectively_ I know that much, given how much money is in my bank account under his name, but...” He trailed off, putting an arm around her. “Sometimes I wonder. I never really write for other people, or at least I didn’t start out doing that. I started writing nonfiction, things I knew and remembered, so...so I wouldn’t forget. Or if I did, so I would still have that knowledge. But then...I started publishing the books on a whim, and when I realized that people seemed to enjoy it, I decided to try my hand at a children’s story.”

“I’m glad you did,” Carina told him. “Rex’s adventures were always so much fun to read. He and his friends going on a quest to stop the Shadow King, meeting the other rulers of the kingdoms of Erebos, collecting the gems for the Prism Blade...as a kid I always liked to pretend I was adventuring with him. It was so exciting, and I always looked forward to reading the next book before I was even halfway done with the one I was on.”

Ardyn laughed. “I think a lot of children enjoyed imagining they were with Rex,” he said. “I based a lot of the books on things I experienced and people I knew, really. It was a way of remembering those things, but...in a fun way. Otherwise it would have probably been too depressing to write about.”

“Oh, _please_ tell me you didn’t actually run around inside a giant talking tree or fight a mountain full of goblins that tell riddles,” Carina asked with a grin. “Or that you actually knew people like the kings and queens.”

“God, no!” Ardyn told her with a laugh. “At least no to the former two. I did, sadly, know people like the kings and queens. They are just as unpleasant and unhelpful.”

Carina snorted. “Ew. I’d hate to have to deal with the real-life Mermaid Queen.” The two of them laughed, and then she paused. “So...are Shadows daemons, then?”

“Well, yes,” Ardyn said, bemused. “Obviously.”

“Don’t you ‘obviously’ me, mister,” she scolded with a giggle. “In any case...really, I loved these books. Thank you for a big part of my childhood.”

“You’re very welcome,” Ardyn said, and reached over to pull her into his lap. She slid over willingly, careful to avoid putting weight on his bad leg, and tucked her head beneath his chin with a happy sigh.

“So you said you wrote and published nonfiction, too? Not under the same pen name, I’m guessing,” she said after a moment. “What did you write?”

Ardyn pointed at the shelf she’d retrieved the Rex books from. “Those,” he said with a chuckle. “Books on Lucian history, mainly, though I’ve also written quite a few books on wildlife.”

“Lucian history?” She asked. “You’re Lucian, then?” He nodded, and she sat back slightly. “Huh...I never thought about it, but you really don’t seem Imperial. I guess no one really wonders where you came from.”

“Not at all; but then again, I maintain the very useful appearance of unapproachability, so no one dares ask, and the rumors that fly around do far more to prevent people from looking too closely,” Ardyn said with a smile of his own. “I like the mystery. But yes, I am Lucian by birth. Or rather...I was born before there _was_ a Lucis, but that’s the kingdom that formed around my homeland.”

Carina hummed an acknowledgement, draping an arm around his shoulders to play absently with his hair. “And you said books on wildlife, too? Why that, of all things?”

“It’s been a hobby of mine for a long time,” he admitted. “Studying wildlife, that is. Nature is fascinating, and I’ve always enjoyed watching the flora and fauna of...well, everywhere, really. Birds especially, but I still love other types of animals.”

Carina laughed. “Birds? No wonder you have a chocobo keychain,” she teased. “But really, Ardyn, that’s sweet. We should go out somewhere to birdwatch sometime. Or you can birdwatch and tell me things, I suppose.”

“That sounds like a grand idea, actually,” he said to her. “I’ll see what strings I can pull to steal you away for a while.”

“...Wait, really?” She asked. “I-- okay!” She laughed. “I wasn’t expecting you to agree so fast, but I’d love to do that. Just let me know a _little_ bit in advance, okay? I like surprises, but your definition of a surprise isn’t exactly...”

He just grinned at her, and she swatted him before untangling herself from his lap to get up. “Let me heat up dinner,” she said, kissing him briefly before heading to the kitchen.

This was so... _domestic_ , she thought. Domestic and wonderful. It couldn’t last, but while it did-- while she was able to hold onto this sad, handsome, incredible man, while she was able to discover all his secrets one by one, know more than anyone else knew, see more than anyone else saw...she’d enjoy every second. Make it all count.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i was thinking about it a while back -- ardyn needed a hobby -- and writing popped up in my head; it seemed to fit pretty well, given how long he's been alive, and...well. i liked it.
> 
> the kids' book thing was spur of the moment but i love it So Much. ardyn based all of the characters in it on his friends and people he knows -- guess who the bitchy mermaid queen is xD
> 
> cutes cutes cutes yay!


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ardyn decides to kidnap carina for a day, and they have a real date.

In the month or so since their conversation over books, Ardyn had been planning something special. It had been something spoken of almost jokingly, but after thinking on it he’d decided to go ahead and just...do it. 

After all, he doubted Carina had been out of Gralea since she’d arrived, and the Empire was stifling. Constantly cold and icy since Shiva’s fall, with more steel and iron than greenery. It wasn’t welcoming, and it was a reason why Ardyn was so grateful his position let him leave as much as he wanted. He hated it here, and he couldn’t imagine he was the only one. 

So little by little and in secret, he got everything together to put his plan into action. Eventually he was ready, and he waited to pounce until Carina was finished dressing one morning, preparing to leave for work. Instead, he caught her from behind with his arms around her waist, laughing at her yelp, and grinned. “You aren’t going into the laboratories today,” he told her matter-of-factly. “We have other plans.”

“We do?” She asked, leaning back against him and eyeing his casual clothing -- just a loose black shirt and a single vest instead of his usual layers, red scarf draped casually over a shoulder. “Won’t I be in trouble for not showing up today? Minister Besithia isn’t exactly fond of me...”

Ardyn snorted. “He’s not fond of anyone, but I’m a high enough rank that I can easily pull it if he makes a fuss about your day off -- which I will do happily, of course.” Carina laughed at that, and leaned her head against his shoulder.

“Okay,” she agreed happily. “I kind of want to ask what you’re up to, but I think I’d like to be surprised. Even though knowing you, that might be a bad idea,” she added with a snicker, covering her mouth when he pouted.

He led her to the apartment building’s elevator, through the lobby, and to the garage and his car, which he’d already packed a couple hours earlier. The fact that he’d gotten up early for this...really should say a lot about how much he’d ended up caring for Carina. Not much usually got in the way of him and his sleep.

There was an early morning fog still in the air, so Ardyn put the top of his car up -- Carina yawned a little, leaning against the window, and let her eyes drift shut. That was alright with him; that way it would really be a surprise, if she wasn’t watching where they were going. He left the city on the winding highway that led out of the crater Gralea sat in, driving through the wintry landscape until the edges of green began to creep up and overpower the white.

He turned off the road once they got to the exit, and eventually pavement turned to dirt -- he pulled over a half an hour or so later, nudging Carina to wake up. “We’re here,” he said, getting out the car and moving to the trunk to grab the things he’d brought. He watched from behind the car as she got out, looking around in shock and awe, covering her mouth with her hands as she recognized the area. 

“Ardyn, a-are we in Tenebrae?” She asked, eyes wide. “We can’t have driven that far, a-and it’s so _green,_ this has to be…” She spun to look at him where he stood and he grinned at her, holding up the picnic basket he’d retrieved from the trunk. “Oh my god,” She said. “Oh my god, _Ardyn._ ”

He laughed, coming over to wrap an arm around her shoulders, and she stood on her toes to kiss him. “I’ve been planning this for a while,” he told her. “Since our conversation over my books, in fact. You suggested we go out and birdwatch, so…here we are. I thought about it, and really, why _not_ make a day of it? You could use an outing -- spending too long in the Imperial capital is not good for one’s health.” 

“I suppose so,” she agreed, stepping away and turning to take his hand in hers. “Come on, then, let’s go find a place to set up.”

He leaned down and kissed her, smiling. “As you wish,” he said. “There’s a lake a short ways off the road from here, if I’ve remembered right. Pretty little meadow beside it, too. Like a fairy tale, really -- but then, much of the unspoiled Tenebraen countryside is like that. Not the variety of Lucis, but it certainly has its own...ethereal charm?” He shrugged. “Like a picture book, all greenery and fields of flowers.”

“You must have seen all of Tenebrae by now,” Carina said as they walked down the gentle slope beside the road, hand in hand. “Hell, you must have seen all of _Eos_ by now. What’s your favorite place?”

Ardyn didn’t need to think about an answer, for once -- something else he liked about being with her; he didn’t have to weigh his words for how much truth to put in them, filter sentences through his masquerade. “Lucis,” he told her. “Lucis will always be my favorite.”

His homeland, his kingdom. Despite all that had happened, there was still an attachment to the place, a fondness. It would always be the kingdom he had once ruled, the place he had grown up in and watched grow from its birth. He knew it all like the back of his hand. From the warm desert and coastline of Leide to the woods and plains of Duscae, from the swamps and wilds of Cleigne to the outlands and their scattered and remote settlements...he had seen it all. He _loved_ it all. It was strange to think that, with how monstrous he was now, but...he would always love his kingdom. He had become this daemon because he'd tried to save it, after all. 

“I would love to see Lucis one day,” Carina told him, smiling when Ardyn's face lit up. “I'd love for you to show me -- I can't imagine a better tour guide.”

“And I'd love to show you Lucis,” he said, trailing to a stop at the edges of the lake. “There's so much to see -- miles and miles of anything you can think of. Forests, lakes, deserts, fields, mountains...it has everything.”

“You talk about it so fondly,” Carina said, teasing but affectionate. “I know I'll love it there if _you_ , of all people, can't hide how much you care about the place.”

She laughed when he pouted, and took the basket when he held it out. Ardyn spread the blanket -- a spare from his closet, plain and pale blue -- on the grass, sitting down and pulling Carina into his lap as she joined him. “Shhh,” he said, resting his chin on her head. “Don’t go around spreading my secrets, now. I’m supposed to be an enigma. Not everyone is so lucky as you, my dear.”

“I know,” she said, giggling and fidgeting at the weight on her. “Why would I want to spread your secrets? I like being special.”

“And you certainly are special,” he replied, reaching over her to slide the basket to them and open it. “The only one in the world who really knows me.”

“You mean knows how much of a _doofus_ you really are under all that mystery,” Carina teased, sliding off his lap to turn around and kiss his nose. “My doofus.”

He laughed, shaking his head. He was proud of how far she’d come in the last year and a half...two years? Mmm, it had almost been three, now. She’d been a shy little mouse at first, beaten down by her peers and superiors and her time at Zegnautus, but the longer she’d been with him, first as friends and now as lovers, the more she’d opened up and regained her courage. He was glad to see it as often as he did now.

“Your doofus,” he agreed, retrieving the bottle of Accordan wine from the basket as well as a pair of glasses. He handed Carina the bottle and she filled their glasses while he retrieved the rest of their lunch. The rest of the contents of the basket were things he’d bought from the various little restaurants and bakeries he frequented -- a few cockatrice sandwiches with soft cheese and a sweet spread, a brightly colored fruit salad, some garula-stuffed dumplings, cornbread croquettes, and custard tarts covered in chocolate -- and Carina gasped in delight.

“ _Wow_ ,” she said, and Ardyn had to smile at her awe. “You really went all out when you bought all this. It all looks delicious!”

He reached for his wineglass and she grabbed hers, raising them in a toast, before starting to eat. It was almost...bittersweet, he realized after a moment, having a picnic like this. The last time he’d done something like this had been...centuries ago, with someone else. Someone he’d loved long ago and lost. He wasn’t the type of person to delude himself into thinking she would begrudge him finding someone else, but that didn’t prevent him from still feeling guilty over her death, all this time later. Even though he knew she would understand, and knew that she would never blame him...he still blamed himself for everything that had happened. 

Thinking about her brought his mood down somewhat, but nonetheless -- being with Carina prevented his thoughts from growing too dark. That was something he appreciated about her, even if it was selfish. That she could distract him from his inner daemons, both figurative and literal...it meant the world to him. That for a little while he could just...relax. Smile and laugh and _mean_ it for once.

They spoke about nonsense as they ate, Carina asking him to tell her stories about what Lucis was like and Ardyn obliging. He told her about the Disc of Cauthess, always burning with an inner fire and held up upon the stony back of the Archaean. About the Nebulawood and its constant, ethereal fog. About the Vesperpool, the huge lake surrounded by thick woods, canopies shading ancient ruins. About the Rock of Ravatogh, ancient burial place of the Infernian, a mountainous peak with magma bubbling in its depths. The deserts, the thickets, the lakes...everything he could remember, he described in as vivid detail as he could.

It hurt, in a strange way -- was it his masochistic streak, punishing him for talking so fondly of things he’d long since lost? It didn’t matter. The look of amazement and wonder upon Carina's face was worth it. Even if he couldn’t take her to the place just yet, he could paint a picture of it in words for her. The morning mist low upon the ground, coloring the lakes and grass in pale monochrome, the sun shining brightly on the water of Galdin Quay like diamonds, the sun setting behind Cauthess and setting the whole sky on fire...nothing could compare. Altissia with its winding river-streets and and sparkling waterfalls beside the pale buildings, Tenebrae with its endless fields of flowers amid a sea of emerald mountains…neither one held a candle to Lucis in his mind.

They finished eating eventually and sat together, watching the swans and ducks swim about upon the lake as the sun crept lower in the sky, sipping their wine in a companionable silence. Ardyn looked around absently, eyes falling upon the rainbow of flowers in the meadow around them, and he smiled. He stood, and Carina watched in puzzlement as he moved over to the flowers, kneeling carefully and beginning to pick some.

She moved next to him, leaning over his shoulder as he worked, fingers plucking stems from the ground and twining them together -- he’d learned how to do this long, long ago, taught by a pale beauty in white and a boy with hair the color of the sun and a smile just as bright. People he’d loved dearly and lost too suddenly. He hadn’t let himself think of them in life for centuries -- he’d let their deaths, and the deaths of his other dear friends, fuel his bitterness and rage, but...this was the first time in a while he thought of them fondly, thought of them with love again.

Carina was really having an effect on him, wasn’t she? She was pulling his humanity back up to the surface, and he no longer even wanted to protest. Even though he knew it wouldn’t last, he no longer cared.

The crown finished, he turned to place it on Carina's head, and she gasped in delight. “It’s beautiful,” she told him. “I didn’t know you knew how to make flower crowns.”

“It’s a little-used talent of mine,” he said, reaching out to cup her face in a hand, running his thumb along her cheek. “The flowers suit you,” he added, showing her the blooms he’d chosen. “Chrysanthemum for being precious to me, daisies for innocence, sweetpea for gratitude, and violet for faithfulness.”

Carina blushed furiously, leaning forward to kiss him. “I know,” she murmured into his lips. “Tenebraens all learn the language of flowers pretty young. Thank you, Ardyn. I love you, too.”

She reached around him to pick a few flowers of her own. “You can’t forget lavender for devotion, and pansies for lovers’ thoughts,” she told him, and he smiled, letting her weave the flowers into his hair before guiding her hands to another blossom.

“Rue for regret,” he murmured, and though she frowned at him, she picked it and put in his hair alongside the others. He reached up to touch them and smiled sadly. “A crown fit for a king, don’t you think?” He asked.

“A king and queen both,” she agreed, smiling -- though he couldn’t return the gesture in full. She didn’t know, not about everything. She didn’t know the meaning behind his talk of kings, the reason for his regret...and that in and of itself was something to regret. Would he tell her before the end, whenever it was? Or would he keep being selfish until the very last moment?

He sighed, smiling at last -- though it didn’t reach his eyes -- and leaned to kiss her. He’d think about that later, he decided. Today was for the two of them. There was time for self-recrimination tomorrow. He’d think about it tomorrow. For now...for now they were the king and queen of the meadow, in each other’s arms. For now he had no worries.

Just for now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THROWS CUTE THINGS LIKE CRAZY bc it'll get sad soon enough.
> 
> a cute date, a cute picnic, some nostalgia-sads, and flowers because flowers are cute and good.
> 
> and ardyn is a sweet nerd who adores his kingdom even when he's a 2000 year old plague hobo. :')


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which the end comes, as they knew it would, and carina finds out the rest of the truth.

The apartment felt empty without Ardyn, Carina thought. Maybe it was just her, but...anywhere Ardyn was always seemed-- not _brighter_ , but livelier. He would fill the air with conversation and laughter, or his presence would simply _be_ there and she’d know she wasn’t alone. Was it pathetic of her to miss him so much when he was only gone for a week? Was it silly? They’d only been a couple for a year, known each other for three. Was it foolish?

Even so, she did miss him. He had gone to Lucis for business, though what business it was he couldn’t say. She didn’t mind that; after all, he _was_ Chancellor. There were a lot of things that she probably couldn’t know. Or things that she wouldn’t want to, either. She had no illusions that Ardyn was an innocent, really. Two thousand years is a long time to be alive, and she didn’t think it was possible to keep one’s hands clean for that long, let alone while working for the Empire.

Sometimes she worried about how little that bothered her, but...she worked for the Empire, too. Regardless of her work on a vaccine, she researched daemons, and she didn’t doubt her research was used for the MTs. Despite her Tenebraen heritage, despite what she wanted or didn’t want, liked or didn’t like...she was still helping take over Eos. What did that make her? She didn’t know.

She was curled up in bed, half asleep and with her face tucked against Ardyn’s pillow, when she heard the front door. She was awake instantly, untangling herself from the comforter and padding out of the bedroom on bare feet. Despite the eternal winter of the outdoors, it was warm inside and so she only wore a pair of loose shorts beneath one of Ardyn’s long-sleeved shirts. “Ardyn?” She called softly, but there was no response.

That, of course, immediately set her on edge, and she hurried out into the living room to find him. He was there, seemingly unharmed, yes, but he was sitting on the floor with his back against the door, head bowed and face in hands. His shoulders shook silently and she could see white indentations where his fingers pressed hard against his temples. “Ardyn!”

She hurried to his side, dropping to her knees and reaching out, only to stop when he pulled away. “What’s wrong, what happened?” She asked. “Where did you go, what--”

She gasped suddenly as he shifted, grabbing her and pulling her into a tight hug, clinging to her like a drowning man would to driftwood. “I’m sorry,” he said, his voice muffled. “God. I’m sorry. I thought we’d have more time. I shouldn’t have-- I shouldn’t have let this happen. It’s too soon, it’s-- it’s not...I’m sorry, Carina.” His voice breaks. “I’m sorry.”

“What-- what are you talking about?” Carina asked, eyes wide. “What do you mean? Ardyn, what’s going on? Are you okay?” Was his condition getting worse? She tried to pull away slightly to look him in the eyes, but he couldn’t meet hers. “Ardyn, talk to me,” she begged. _“Ardyn!”_

He didn’t speak for a long moment, smoky grey tears tracking down his face. She tried to get him to look at her, reaching up to tilt his face towards hers, but he pulled away. God, what could be wrong? This scared her -- she’d never seen him like this before, not even when she’d found out he was sick. She’d never seen him so...broken. And what he was saying made no sense. More time for what? _What_ was too soon?

“I--” He began finally. “There are-- there are things I haven’t told you. A...A lot I haven’t told you. And now I don’t have-- _we_ don’t have-- there’s no more time. It’s all over now, this-- this dream, this very pleasant dream.” He laughed hollowly. “It’s over.”

“Ardyn…?” Carina’s voice wavered. “Ardyn, please. Talk to me. What haven’t you...what haven’t you told me?”

“Everything,” he rasped in response. Before she could react he let go of her, moved her gently away to stand and pace the room, unable to keep still despite his agitation worsening his limp. She watched him with a tight, frightened feeling in her chest, hands curled in on themselves and nails digging into her palms. She wasn’t afraid of _him_ , no -- she wasn’t. If she hadn’t been afraid when she found out he was sick, then she wasn’t now. But what she was afraid of was...that she had no idea what he was going to say. Whatever it was, that it affected him like this...it scared her.

“My name--” He began, his voice still tight and hoarse with emotion. He was pacing back and forth, dragging hands through his hair and refusing to look at her, coat swirling around his legs like wings. “My name is not-- it isn’t Izunia.” He laughed bitterly. “It’s not. I-- it’s never been. Izunia was...it was my father's surname. Before it all happened. My brother and I had a different one.”

“Your brother?” Carina asked timidly. “You...have a brother?”

“Had,” Ardyn said with a bitter laugh. “I _had_ a brother. He was-- I--” He swallowed. “This is the first time I’ve told _anyone_ this in two thousand years,” he admitted after a moment. “Forgive me for...for not knowing how.”

She nodded, standing shakily to move over to the couch and sit on the edge. “Take-- take your time,” she said softly. 

Ardyn stopped pacing, hands clutching the counter and his back towards her. She couldn’t see his face, but his shoulders, the lines of his body...they were like rubber bands stretched almost to breaking.

“My name,” he began shakily. “My name is Ardyn Lucis Caelum.”

Carina gasped aloud before she could stop herself, a hand coming up to press over her mouth. “Lucis-- Lucis Caelum?” She whispered. “Lucian _royalty_...?” He was old, she knew that. He’d told her. Two thousand years...he was a two thousand year old king? “How…?”

Ardyn took a slow breath. “Yes,” he said, his voice quiet. It wasn’t shaking anymore, but simply soft and resigned. Tired. Defeated. “I was king, two thousand years ago. The first king of Lucis, the Founder, the...the one who should have begun the line.”

“You-- you were?” She asked faintly. “But-- the history books, the stories, they all…”

“They don’t mention me, no,” he said. “They wouldn’t. I was struck from the history books a long time ago. Forgotten. _Deliberately_ forgotten. Because of what I did.”

Carina’s breath caught again. “What...you did?” She repeated, her voice catching. What did he do? What could he have done that made them wipe him from history entirely? What could he have done that ended here, two thousand years later, with him sick from the Scourge and still living, working for the empire that aimed to take over Lucis -- his home, his _kingdom?_

She wasn’t scared of him, she told herself. She _wasn’t_.

“I--” He laughed quietly. “I took it upon myself to end the Scourge,” he said, his voice heavy with rueful exhaustion. “I was young. I was terrified of daemons. I was selfish and proud, and I--” He trailed off. “I was in love with the Oracle,” he murmured. “I loved her, and so I didn’t want her to die young like her mother, the healing magic she received from the gods burning her out like a too-short candle.”

“Oh,” Carina whispered. She was Tenebraen by birth -- she knew some of the rumors, the stories. No one ever knew for sure, knew the facts. But they did know that the Oracles were all women, all golden-haired, and they never lived to fifty. Some of them never saw forty. To hear it confirmed wasn’t surprising, but… “What did you do?” She repeated.

“I started healing people myself,” Ardyn said. He still hadn’t turn to look at her, still bent over the counter with his hands clutching the edges hard enough that his fingers were white with the strain. “Not with the magic the gods gave me -- the magic of kings has the same effect as the Oracle’s magic. Burns us out like lit matches. I didn’t want that. I didn’t want to dance to the gods’ tune. I didn’t want to fix their problems for them because they were _too damn lazy and arrogant to do it themselves--”_ He cut himself off with a snarl of anger, and she could see the counter crack and crumble under his grip.

“Ardyn!” She said sharply, hands clutching the hem of her shirt, and he shook himself like a wet dog. ( _She wasn't afraid_.)

“I-- right,” he murmured. “I had always hated what the gods had done to our families. Made us...pawns. They fought their war and then left it to the mortals to clean up the mess they made. I resented that. So I wanted to-- to fix it without using their power. Save people _my_ way.” He laughed, shaking his head. “But I couldn’t cure the Scourge. Only the Oracle can purge it entirely from the infected. I couldn’t cure it. I could only... _take_ it.”

“Take it…?” Carina frowned, confused for a moment, and then it hit her. She gasped, standing, her heart skipping a beat. Oh. Oh, _no_. No, he didn’t. He hadn’t-- oh, _god_. “Oh, _Ardyn_ ,” she managed. “You made _yourself_ sick to save people...?”

He laughed, a humorless sound. “I did,” he said. “Selfish hypocrite that I was, I thought-- I thought _martyring_ myself was better than letting her do it. I would be fine, I told myself. It was my _duty_. I saved hundreds, _thousands_ , I told myself as I knelt in my bathroom throwing up black sludge. It was worth it.”

“...Was it?” Carina ventured, though she had a feeling she knew the answer. Even if he hadn’t yet said it aloud...the very fact of his presence here, the exhaustion and the anger and the bitterness, it said it for him.

“...I don’t know,” he said finally. “I’m sure everyone I saved was...grateful. But it didn’t fix anything. And then...” He turned, finally, and it _hurt_ to see the pain and regret and bitterness on his face, no longer hidden by lies and secrets. “And then my brother betrayed me.”

He laughed. “I didn’t see it coming. No, I didn’t _want_ to. I loved him. Our parents died when he was young -- I _raised_ him. I didn’t want to see it, didn’t want to believe he would be envious of me. Didn’t want to believe it would drive him to-- to _betray_ me. To call me up and claim I was treasonous, blaspheming, to claim I was a _power-hungry monster_. Just to get rid of me, to take my throne, my titles, my name, my legacy, to take from me everything he coveted. _Everything.”_ He looked away, but the old memories seemed to be alive in his eyes; Carina could see the pain in them, see how far away his gaze was. “We fought. He had guards behind him, guards he turned to his cause. We fought, and the Oracle-- Stella-- she tried to stop us.”

His left hand clenched, and another smoky tear rolled down his face. “I couldn’t stay my hand in time,” he whispered. “She got in between us, our swords already mid-strike, and then she was-- and then she was gone.”

“Oh, god,” Carina whispered. She knew -- she had always known -- she wasn’t Ardyn’s first love. She couldn’t have been. He was so old, had seen so much, there was no way she was his first. But to hear this, to know how much he had loved her -- to know that he had sacrificed himself for her, to see how much her death still pained him...the guilt he bore, god, how could he still be here? “I’m so sorry.”

“It was my fault,” he said quietly. “She found out what I was doing, went to Somnus to try to get him to stop me. She didn’t know what he was planning, either. He used her, too.” He shook his head. “Probably blackmailed her with our daughter.”

“Your daughter?” Oh, god -- he’d been a _father?!_

“I never knew her,” Ardyn said ruefully. “She probably didn’t tell me out of concern, because of what I was doing to myself. I don’t blame her. I just wish I...I just wish I had met her. _Once_ , before she died. Young, too. An Oracle like her mother, dead before her time.”

He ran a hand through his hair, eyes still distant. “I let them arrest me, then. They took me to an island -- if you look on the maps of Lucis, it’s still there. It’s in books, too. Angelgard. There are legends. Half of them are because of me.” Carina knew the place he was talking about. The dead island, with its stone structures and black peaks like wings. “I was imprisoned there. I could-- I could do nothing for two years. Just wait for whatever was to come.” A pause. “There were guards, though. They told me what happened to the others. My Shield. My advisor. My best friend. I loved them, too. They were...they and Stella were everything to me, back then.”

“And I couldn’t save them.” A thin trail of black blood ran from his mouth, and she realized he was biting his lip. “Hermes, hunted down and killed in the streets like a dog. Gilgamesh, chased to his family training grounds and slaughtered with his men. Pyrrhus, left alive and crippled to raise my daughter until she was old enough to be Oracle and then put down. And me.” He finally turned to Carina, watching him with wide eyes. “They tried to execute me, you know.” He turned, pulling down the back of his collar and lifting his hair so she could see the back of his neck, where an old white scar ran horizontally across it like a necklace to match the one across his throat. “They should have killed me then. I should be dead.”

“But you’re not,” Carina murmured. “You’re still here.”

“I’m still here,” Ardyn agreed. “Bahamut himself told me I wasn’t allowed to die. I was impure. _Corrupted_. The Scourge in me was too great to be allowed into the afterlife, so here I am. Immortal. Undying and eternally sick, not human but not quite a daemon. Betrayed by my brother and erased from history, and condemned by the gods to suffer because I didn’t want to do what _they_ wanted me to, didn’t want to sit idly by and accept my fate as they planned it.” His voice grew more bitter as he spoke, and then he laughed, and it was a sharp and painful sound. “And then they gave me a new fate. You’ve read the Cosmogony, haven’t you?”

Carina swallowed, unsure where this was going but almost frightened. “Yes,” she said quietly. “E-Everyone who grew up in Tenebrae did.”

“Then you know the prophecy,” Ardyn said, turning and still smiling horribly. “The Chosen King, put on this world to end the Scourge once and for all. Bring back the dawn and all that.” He spread his arms wide. “And that’s where I come in. I am the Accursed One,” he said, his voice full of something like shattered glass, all jagged and broken edges and lined with bitterness and spite. “I’m what the Chosen King has to _kill_. The Scourge made flesh.”

Carina knew she was crying now, but she couldn’t stop it and didn’t really want to. “What happened while you were gone?” She whispered.

“It’s the beginning of the end,” he told her. “The Emperor sent me to negotiate the terms of a ceasefire with the King of Lucis -- my nephew, a hundred or so generations removed. Surrender all lands outside of the capital and marry his son off to the Oracle, and in return...the war ends.” He snorted. “All lies. The Empire plans to use the treaty signing as a way in to attack Insomnia. I can’t do anything to prevent that, and half of me doesn’t want to. But this is where it begins.”

“How?” Carina asked softly, wiping at her face half-heartedly.

“The prince is the Chosen King,” he said hollowly. “He’ll be off to Altissia to meet Lady Lunafreya, away from the capital with his entourage. And so he’ll be king when Insomnia falls. And so his destiny will begin to tick down the minutes. He’ll follow his path -- the Oracle will help him -- and it will lead him right to me.”

Carina nodded, slowly. “And...you’ll die,” she said softly. “Or will you kill him?”

“I…” He began, almost startled at her lack of reaction. “I intend to kill him,” he admitted finally. “Not yet, not now, not until the power of the Chosen is his. Until then I’ll help him and gladly so. But once he’s come into his destiny...then I’ll kill him. The Oracle, too.”

“Why?” She asked.

“To make the gods take responsibility,” he told her, smiling humorlessly. “If their tools are broken, then if they want to end the Scourge they’ll have to come down here and kill me themselves. If they do that, then I win. And if the prince kills me first...the Scourge still ends, and I win anyway.”

Carina swallowed. “I get it,” she said, managing a very tiny smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “There’s no way this will end with you alive. Either...either the prince kills you, saving the world, or you kill him and the gods kill you like you want -- because they should have fixed it themselves in the first place -- and the world is saved that way.” She laughed weakly. “You’re right. This is it, isn’t it? It’s all over, or it-it will be.”

“I…” Ardyn began helplessly. “I thought you would try to stop me,” he said after a moment. “I thought-- you know what I’m doing will kill hundreds of people. Without the Oracle, the darkness will...you _know_ that. You know it better than anyone. The daemons…it will get worse before it gets better. Are you really alright with that?”

“I have to be,” she said, startled by her own words. But she swallowed and then started speaking again, without thinking and without a filter. Just...talking, before she could catch herself and stop herself. “The most effective cures aren’t pretty. They aren’t-- I know people are going to die. People have already died. Countless people. Hundreds of thousands over two thousand years, maybe millions. The Oracle can’t save everyone. You’re right, I know that better than a lot of people. And more people will die before this is over. But...you may be doing this out of spite and out of revenge for what the gods did to you, but you’re also...you’re also still trying to save the world. Even if you don’t realize that, I can see it. You know your death will end the plague. And that’s what this ends with. That’s how you win.” Her voice cracked. “And you’ve been alive so long, seen so much...lost so many people. I couldn’t understand how you haven’t just...broken. But you have, haven’t you? You broke ages ago, over and over. But you _can’t die_. You can’t end it yourself. You just-- you had to wait. You had to wait, and you had to suffer, and you-- you found one thing, one little thing after all this time that made it a little easier, but now it’s time and--” 

She broke down, covering her mouth with her hands. “Now it’s time,” she whispered. “I’m not going to stop you. I don’t-- I can’t. I’ve only known you for-- for a blink of an eye compared to the life you’ve lived. I don’t have the right.” She moved towards him, cupping his tear-stained cheeks in her hands. “But if I could make you happy, if I could-- if I could ease some of the pain I know you must be living with every single moment, if I could comfort you even a _little_ for the past year, then...then I’m content.”

She leaned up to kiss him and he reached out for her, pulling her close to him and returning the kiss. They both sunk to their knees, tears still dripping down their faces, and clung to each other. Knowing it was over, knowing that this was it. Their days together were numbered, and eventually -- soon -- he would die.

“I love you,” she whispered to him softly, leaning her head on his shoulder, one hand stroking his hair. “I love you, Ardyn. I always will.”

“I don’t deserve it,” he murmured. “But thank you. Thank you for-- thank you.” His voice shook and he trembled in her arms, letting himself be weak for a moment, just for this moment. “I love you, too,” he said softly. “I shouldn’t have let myself, I shouldn’t have done this to you, but I-- I love you. I’m sorry.”

They sat like that for a while, then. Just trying to enjoy the last bit of time they’d have together, trying to prolong it as long as possible. It would end soon, too soon -- they’d known that from the start, and now that the end was very near, now...all they could do was hold each other and let it come. For it would come.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> we all knew it had to get Angsty soon enough, and i mean....they can't put off what's gonna happen. this is canon compliant, after all. :')
> 
> the truth hurts, and it hurts a lot, but carina is pragmatic, and she knows...she knows it has to happen. even if she doesn't want it to. rationalizing it helps a lot, too, but she knows he's the villain here ;; it's hard to love a villain, but...she does.


	12. Chapter 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which it's time to leave the empire, and no one wants to say goodbye.

The waiting was the worst part, Carina thought. The lab had been going mad with work since the attack on Insomnia, everyone working triple and quadruple shifts and Verstael flipped between giddy and twice as irritable as he usually was. 

And Ardyn…Ardyn was hardly around. Not that Carina didn't understand; she'd struggled with it for a while since he'd told her, but she'd mostly come to terms with the fact that her lover was the villain in this story. Not entirely through his choice, no, but...all the same, he was the villain.

There wasn't much she could do about it but continue her work, more fervently than ever before -- if what Ardyn had said was true, then the world would soon be eternally dark -- not forever, but for long enough that she knew her vaccine would be invaluable. Ardyn knew it, too; before he'd left for the false signing he'd let her take a blood sample from him to study in the hopes that it could help.

And it did -- she wasn't sure whether it was his royal bloodline, his unique state of limbo, or countless other factors, but she was able to use it to finally, _finally_ , synthesize what seemed to be a workable vaccine. It was nerve-wracking, watching the rats and waiting for a sign -- or a lack of one -- but in the weeks that followed, with every day she came to work and saw the rats skittering around, hale and whole, every day she ran tests to see if the Scourge in the vaccine was still inactive...it gave her hope.

And even when she took a vial of the virus and injected one of the rats with it…nothing happened.

And she'd never been so happy to see nothing.

The only thing to do after that was replicate the results, and that was far simpler -- though she didn't have that many supplies left, due to other projects taking the lions’ share in the wake of the signing and the fall of Insomnia. She ended up being able to make a dozen or so more doses, but that was all. It was far less than she'd hoped, but at least she'd been able to finish _something_ before zero hour.

When that was, though, was anyone's guess. People came and went and she saw little and less of Ardyn, her only source of news the radio and televisions. And even then she knew it was biased.

The news…she had watched the footage of the night of the attack as many times as she could bear. It was dark and the footage had been taken from MT helmet cameras and the like so it was hard to make anything out, but... but she could see the statues. The kings of eld, if she recalled the stories right. Ardyn's _family_. His father and his brother, maybe more, coming to life and fighting for their burning, broken city.

The city Ardyn used to rule...she had to wonder how he'd felt, watching the carnage and destruction. Was he sad? Did it hurt? Did it feel like long-awaited vengeance for what his brother had done, or did it taste like ashes? He was getting closer to what he wanted, but...did he wonder if the cost was worth it?

He'd chosen to love her despite it all, though, hadn't he? Maybe that was... well, she hoped it had made him happy. Made his last few years a little brighter. She knew she was losing him -- nothing she could do changed that. But if he'd been happy, then she'd done enough.

She got home that night, letting herself into the empty apartment with the cooled case of vaccines tucked into her bag (because like hell was she leaving it there), and after heating up some dinner she put the vaccines in the fridge and went to bed.

It was lonely, living alone in Ardyn's -- in _their_ apartment, eating alone and sleeping in an otherwise empty bed. She missed him desperately, despite knowing what he was meant for -- she at least wanted to say goodbye when it was time. She hadn't wanted him to just... _vanish_ , like morning mist. Like he'd never been there at all, the only proof he'd really existed the detritus of his life left behind in the corners and closet and bookshelves.

If her pillow was a little damp with tears most mornings, then... that was inevitable, wasn't it?

That next morning, though, she woke to a hand in her hair and a kiss pressed to her forehead as she stirred, and she was alert in moments, sitting up to throw her arms around Ardyn where he sat beside her on the edge of the bed. 

“Good morning to you, too,” he said fondly, shifting to tug her half into his lap. “I'd ask if you missed me, but I think you already answered that.”

She laughed quietly. “Hush,” she told him, kissing him affectionately before pulling back to look him over. He looked... tired. A little pale, a little exhausted, a little in pain, his hair and clothes a little disheveled...she sighed and kissed his nose. “You look awful. Have you been taking care of yourself?”

“Mmm….” He smiled slightly. “Not to your standards, my dear. Too much has been happening. But I've been attempting to, at least.”

She frowned at him, but shook her head in defeat. “Best I can ask for,” she admitted. “Just be more careful. I saw you on TV, and that stupid wing thing isn't a substitute for a real cane, as mysterious as you want to look. And...look, even if you can't _die_ , it's... just don't do anything too reckless-- well. Unless you have to, but-- but-- oh, just be careful,” she said with a sigh, leaning against his shoulder.

“My wing is _brilliant_ , thanks very much, and it's far more stylish than a _stick_ ,” he teased, but his expression softened and grew serious. “I can't tell you not to worry, can I? Even when you know you don't need to.”

She shook her head. Regardless of whether or not he would die soon, she'd worry for him. Someone needed to. He needed to know that _someone_ out there would be thinking of him.

He smiled, sad and tired but endlessly grateful, and kissed her. “Thank you,” he said. “It's nice to know not everyone thinks I'm a _creepy old dude_.”

Carina burst into giggles, causing Ardyn to pout. “I-I’m sorry!” She managed. “But-- but oh my god, who _called_ you that?!”

“Noctis,” Ardyn admitted ruefully. “I've met him and his friends a few times now.” She frowned at him, confused, and he laughed softly. “I'm not doing anything to him yet. It's only _after_ he gains the power the gods want him to have that I'll…” He doesn't say it, just trailing off, but they both know what finished the sentence. “Before then, he's just a boy I _want_ to succeed. So I've been... helping. Sort of.”

“Sort of?” Carina repeated, raising an eyebrow.

“You know me,” he replied with a teasing smile. “I’m allergic to straightforwardness. So... I know that they don't know what I want or why I'm helping, and I'm content with that. Well, that and giving them a hard time.” His smile faltered, and it was then she realized it didn't reach his eyes. 

“What...what are they like?” She asked.

As she'd suspected, it was the right question to ask. The smile vanished and he sighed deeply, sadly. “They're…too _familiar_ sometimes,” he admitted. “Noctis is quiet and rather awkward, but he's got a clever tongue and a good heart. Not to mention he seems to like sweets and naps as much as I do.” Carina laughed.

“He _is_ your nephew, a few hundred generations removed,” she pointed out. 

“That he is,” Ardyn agreed quietly. “It's... hard to be around him. What I have to do...he deserves better. But there's no other way out of it. I can't…”

She kissed him. “I know,” she said softly. “He's too young to die like you said he has to. But it's not like the gods have given _anyone_ much choice.” 

“Mm…” Ardyn sighed. “The others are familiar enough to make me think the gods specifically have it out for me more than usual,” he added. “An excitable blond best friend, a gruff and devoted Shield -- still Amicitia, at that, after all these years -- and a clever advisor whose rather obviously a mother hen... I really wasn't expecting to be hit with nostalgia _every_ damn time I see them.” He huffs. “But regardless of how infuriating it is that I see so much in them I recognize, I…”

Carina sighed, reaching to play with his hair. “Regardless, the story has to go this way,” she finished. “I suppose the best you can do is try to enjoy it for what it is -- a reminder of better times -- before it has to end.”

“It's ending soon,” he told her. “The boys should be in Altissia by the end of the week. Once they are, once it's time for dear Lunafreya to make her contract with the Hydraean…”

His somber expression told her the rest. She wished the Oracle didn't have to...she wished she could be alright. But she knew what had to happen...and given that the Oracle spoke with the gods, she might, too. That was oddly reassuring, that Lunafreya might be aware and ready for her fate: it was still terrible, but...she _knew_. 

“You're leaving, too, then?” She asked.

“I am.” He sighed and stood, pulling her up with him. “But I'm accompanying our high commander, so I came back to Gralea. And that meant I had to see you.”

He had to say goodbye. They both knew that, but they both thought that if they didn't say it... maybe it wouldn't be forever. Ardyn kissed her, and then stepped away. “Get dressed,” he said with a sad smile. “There's some things we need to talk about.”

That didn't sound good, Carina thought, but she did as told -- noticing to her surprise that a set of clothes were laid out on her bed for her; just a pair of jeans and one of her favorite sweaters (and the grey scarf she'd stolen from him the night of the dance), nothing special, but that it _was_ there was...odd.

She entered the living room, tying her hair back, and stopped in surprise. A pair of decent-sized suitcases were sitting by the door, and she was fairly sure that both those and the duffel bag with them was most of her things. Aside from that, Greenie’s cage was there, the little tonberry shuffling around inside curiously.

“What's all this?” She asked Ardyn, who was leaning against the counter holding something.

“You can't stay in the Empire,” he told her. “It won't be safe for much longer. It's only a matter of time before the daemons get loose and the MTs won't stay obedient the darker it gets.”

Carina's eyes widened, but she can't argue with him. “I... I always knew it would be dangerous to keep so many live daemons in Zegnautus. But will it really happen so soon?”

“Yes,” Ardyn said, and the certainty in his voice was almost frightening. “The longer the night gets, the stronger daemons become. Not even magitek can hold them back forever.” His face softened. “So you have to go. Get to Lucis. Go to Meldacio, find the hunters -- they'll be the best defense the world's got once the long night falls.” He held up what he was holding, and Carina realized it was the case of vaccine doses. “This is what I think it is?”

She nodded. “I finished it,” she said with a tired smile. “No, _we_ did. It was your blood sample that helped get it right. There's only twelve more doses, but…”

“I'm sure the hunters will be more than willing to help you make more,” Ardyn told her, reaching out to cup her face with a hand. “The prospect of a vaccine is too good for them to pass up.” He smiled, leaning down to rest his forehead against hers. “You’ll be invaluable to them, and that means you’ll be _safe_.”

 _I’ll be safe with you,_ she wanted to say, but… that was a lie and they would both know it. Her place wasn’t with him, not at his side. She couldn’t be there. He had to walk alone now, as much as it hurt her to think that. “I…” She began, and then swallowed. “I took a dose myself already,” she told him. “So-- so I’ll be safe from infection, too.”

“Good,” he said, and pulled her into his arms. “Good. Just...I don’t know if I’ll see you again, Carina,” he admitted. “Everything is on its way to the end. This might be…” He couldn’t finish the sentence again, but this time she doesn’t say it either. He shook his head slowly, burying his face in her hair. “I love you,” he said quietly. “The past couple years have been...the brightest my life’s been in thousands of years. Thank you for-- for everything.”

She doesn’t look up, if only to keep him from seeing her cry. “I love you, too,” she whispers. “Thank you for letting me be part of your story, Ardyn, even-- even if it was only for a moment. I won’t forget you.”

“I doubt anyone will,” he muttered, but then pushes her back to look at her with a sad smile. “But...you’ll remember me well, Carina. I won’t be forgotten this time, and...that means-- that means a lot.”

She smiled back wetly. “I’ll never forget,” she promised. “No matter what.”

He’d been wiped from history once, and after this -- once the sun set and rose again -- he would be vilified and demonized: not without reason, she knew that. She held no illusions what would happen and what had to happen. She thought she should be more...upset about it, perhaps, but after dwelling on it the past few weeks, the initial grief and pain and confusion had settled into...resignation, she supposed. She couldn’t stop him. She knew that. She couldn’t do much of anything besides what little she was already doing -- she had her role to play, and it was only a supporting character -- and he was the villain. And there wasn’t a point in crying over it more than she already had. All she could do was...was live, and remember the man she loved. Make sure that Ardyn Lucis Caelum was remembered, at least by one person, for who he really was, not just who he made himself into.

He stepped back, shaking his head as if trying to convince himself not to linger, and reached into a coat pocket, holding out his keys. “Take my car,” he said quietly. “It’ll get you far enough into Tenebrae for you to take a ferry to Lucis. The trip to Galdin will likely take several days, but-- but it should keep you safe. It’s far enough away from Altissia that you won’t...you won’t get caught up in it.”

“In what?” Carina asked, but then paused, and stifled a sad little laugh. “The Mermaid Queen,” she said fondly, shaking her head. “That’s where the monuments to the Hydraean are, and that’s...if the Oracle is there…”

“Mmm,” Ardyn murmured. “She’ll be making a contract with her for Noctis, as she’s done with two already. You heard the news about Cauthess, I’m sure.” She had -- the Archaean, gone. And clearly more had happened...this really was beginning to be the end of it. The real end. “It will be quite the show…but you should be safe.”

Carina nodded wordlessly; she didn’t want to tell him she wasn’t afraid of the Astrals. She-- she may have been born Tenebraen, brought up to revere the Six and live in quiet awe of the Fleuret line -- and the latter still held true, at least -- but living with Ardyn, _loving_ him...it’s made her realize that the gods were...they were arrogant. They were arrogant and selfish, forcing humans to do what the gods should have done and forcing them to do it in exactly the way they wanted. Like a millennia-long game of chess, and...they didn’t seem to care who it hurt.

She wouldn’t go so far as to say she _hated_ the gods, but...she certainly saw them for what they really were. Inhuman. 

And though she wanted to find another way, kick over the chessboard as Ardyn had once tried to do...her cure -- there was no more time to wait for it. She’d lost the race against time and the fate she’d desperately wanted to save Ardyn from, save a pair of innocent children from. 

She stepped forward to kiss him one last time, wiping her tears on her sleeve. “I love you,” she repeated. “And--”

She broke off. “I won’t say it,” she told him. “I-- I don’t want to hear it, either. Just-- we’ll see each other again.” One day, they would. Even if she had to wait a lifetime to catch up to him, she would see him again. She just didn’t want to hear the word _goodbye_. 

“....we’ll see each other again,” he agreed, smiling sadly, and bent to kiss her forehead. “Now go, Carina. Before it gets dark.”

He was right-- she had to go before nightfall, or at least make it to the ferry by then. It was a long road to the Tenebrae port, and...she threw her arms around him in a hug, choking back tears, and then broke away, grabbing her bags and Greenie’s cage. “I--” She began, and shook her head. There was nothing left to say.

She didn’t look back on her way to the car, putting her things in the back and putting the convertible’s hood up. She didn’t think she could bear seeing him watching her leave, and she didn’t think he could bear seeing her cry again.

But they had to part ways -- and they did. She just hoped...she just hoped he’d find her again, at least once more before the end. It was a flimsy hope but...it would keep her going.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :( 
> 
> he's right, tho, i mean you saw ch 13 and zegnautus - he isn't gonna let his girlfriend go through that, no way. and honestly, he also wants her out of the way so neither of them have to deal with her watching him be Villainous. 
> 
> meldacio is the safest place for her, and that vaccine...i know it's not particularly Canon, but it does make sense. and they can't save _everyone..._ it's hard to keep making a vaccine with such limited supplies. it does kind of work within canon :')


	13. Chapter 13

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which the sun is gone, and the two of them have one last meeting.

It had been eight years since the sun had stopped coming up. Well -- give or take. It was eight years since the days had begun to wane, lasting fewer and few hours until the sun just...never rose one day. And so it had been.

The hunters of Meldacio had their hands full constantly -- training civilians to shoot or hold a sword, teaching them to defend themselves, while defending them as well. There were always daemons, always somewhere to go help, always lights to fix and havens to fortify, always supplies to ship in and out and collect from fields gone to overgrowing from neglect.

Carina had her own little half-apartment in Lestallum, partitioned off 'room' in a warehouse she’d converted to a home and doctor’s office -- the town was the last real outpost these days, big enough to house the survivors and well-lit enough to keep the daemons away, thanks to the power plant.

She’d never been trained as a doctor, not really, but she was a daemonologist, a virologist, and she knew the basics; she treated what she could, lent what aid she could -- and gave the most important thing she could give: her vaccine. It was hard to gather the things she needed for it, but the hunters were happy to help, raiding clinics and empty outpost hospitals and dragging back the corpses of small daemons for her. If it meant that she could make one less person vulnerable, then they would fight for that. 

She was glad to help; she watched too many people fall ill during this long night, seen too many telltale signs of someone she’d been unable to save. Even though she was able to protect dozens, they lost dozens more. She watched them succumb, seen them cough black ichor and seen their darkened veins, seen them either disappear into the wilds (their dogtags retrieved from their empty clothes later) or put a gun to their own heads rather than hurt anyone.

Every time she saw it, she was reminded of the cure just out of her reach, and the cure that they were all waiting for -- she was reminded of the man she still loved, the man who had brought down the sun, the man who would die, _wanted_ to die, for the Infernian’s crime...and the boy who would die at the gods’ behest.

She’d met them by now, the three who had travelled with the prince. They had lost him, she’d heard; the crystal had him now, and she wondered when he’d return. In the meantime, the three left behind fought alongside the hunters -- and she’d met them all. The hunters had insisted they be some of the first to get the vaccine, as...well, what sort of Kingsguard would they be if they weren’t there to greet their king?

Ardyn hadn’t said much about them when they’d spoken of the quartet, only that they’d been painfully familiar at times -- and knowing he’d written of his friends in the books no one knew he’d penned…it wasn’t as hard as she’d expected to understand why. 

They were quieter, sadder, as she’d imagined they’d be, but the freckled blond still had a bright smile when he could muster one, a laugh like a sliver of the missing sun. The blinded aide was solemn and kind and seemed to always have clever advice to give, and when he was in Lestallum the semi-permanent residents ate like kings. 

And the Shield...well, she saw him more often than most, given that his girlfriend, the ecologist, was also a semi-permanent resident in the outpost. Sania was a brilliant woman, and Carina enjoyed a friendship with her that had started in part thanks to Ardyn; or rather, his interest in ecology had made her curious enough to approach the woman. That said, she saw Gladiolus Amicitia quite regularly, and though he was fairly intimidating at first (anyone who could sit through getting a tattoo _that_ big was a force to be reckoned with) he proved to be a decent sort, albeit a bit gruff.

Despite that, though, she never spoke to any of the three at length. Not because she disliked them -- not at all. They were sweet young men, and her heart ached for them. It was...well, how was she to face them when the man she loved most in the world was the very man that had taken their prince from them? She couldn’t. Or she could, but it would feel false.

The more years that passed, the harder it was to pretend that she could still finish her cure in time. She’d denied the passage of weeks and months at first, hoping that there was still a chance, still a way to fix it without anyone dying, but as those turned to years...the hope had been all but snuffed out -- certainly it could be finished, and soon; she had made much progress, but...not soon enough to save him.

Still she tried, though, even if it was just to say she’d done all she could when the sun finally rose and she was alone.

It was...well, no one could tell if it was day or night anymore, and Carina's internal clock was off as it was, so she had no idea what time it was. But she was bent over her desk transcribing notes from the last report one of the hunters had given her when she heard a noise. She squeaked, looking up. “Hello?” She asked, but no one responded. Had someone really knocked? She stood, frowning, and walked to the door. No one was visible through the peephole, so she sighed and turned to go back to her desk…and then there was a noise again. This time she could tell it came from the window, so she moved to look out of it. 

A third time, and she saw clearly now what was making the sound -- a pebble tossed at the window. She blinked, confused, and peered into the hazy half-light to try and see who was... _oh_. Oh, there was only one person who wouldn’t just--

She grabbed her coat and scarf and was out the door before the thought finished in her head, scurrying around to the back of the building and following the dark figure she'd seen out of the city limits and into the tunnel that led away. Not too far, out of caution, but...then again, if it _were_ him, his presence would be the safest place in Eos to be during this long night.

“Is it you?” She called softly, almost hopefully, though she was half afraid to speak his name. It was a curse to do so now, and she wondered if that’s how it had been all those centuries ago, when he’d first been betrayed and cast out...she wondered if it hurt now as it did then.

“It is,” came a quiet voice from the shadows, and she almost threw herself at him in her haste to close the distance. He caught her in his arms and pulled her into a tight hug, burying his face in her hair, and she clung back. He seemed...thinner than before, she thought. Trembling just a bit, as if he was too tired to stand upright. But when she broke away to look up at him, she couldn’t see it in his face. He was pale, yes, and his eyes held that same endlessly sad and tired expression that had been in them since he’d told her his truth, but his smile was genuine. “It’s good to see you’ve been doing well, my dear.”

“I’ve been alright,” she agreed, trying to hold back the tears in her eyes. “You were right...the hunters have been good to me. We’ve been safe, and--” She wanted to tell him so much, about the progress she’d made on her cure, about meeting the prince’s entourage, about everything she’d learned from Sania...but none of it wanted to cross her lips. There was something else that had to be said first. “...why now?” She asked softly, not wanting to ask or wanting to know, but needing to.

The smile faded slightly, and his hands slipped down to take hers in his. “Because it’s almost time,” he said softly. “I can feel it. The world is getting ready for the Chosen King’s return, and...it won’t be long now. I don’t know when, but soon.” He swallowed something almost like a shudder. “Even the gods are preparing for it; that’s how I know there isn’t much time left. Even the Infernian…”

“The Infernian?” She repeated, eyes widening. “But-- if he’s here, if he’s waking, wouldn’t simply killing _him_ …”

“Unfortunately not,” Ardyn said, his eyes shadowed. “That’s not how the gods have built this story. Killing him will ensure the Scourge doesn’t return; it won’t purge what’s already here. That honor belongs to me, steeped in it as I am.”

“But that’s…” Carina trailed off, shaking her head. There was no point in arguing with the gods, was there? What had to happen would happen regardless of what the chess-pieces wanted. “So you came to…”

“Bid farewell,” he finished quietly, and Carina couldn’t conceal the flinch or the tears that pricked at her eyes. “I know we didn’t want to say it, but this is…I couldn’t simply stay away until the end. I didn’t want that to be the last time I saw you.” He looked away, towards the moonless night above them. “I wanted one last memory with you before I go.”

The words were like a knife to her heart, but she understood. “I know,” she whispered. “I’d...I was hoping for the same. I wanted to see you again. Just one more time.”

He squeezed her hands tightly. “Sit with me awhile,” he said. “You can leave before you’re missed. Just...sit with me?”

“You don’t even have to ask,” she told him quietly, smiling, and he pulled her to sit with him, his back against the tunnel wall and her in his lap. She rested her head on his chest, staring down at their entwined fingers. 

“I wish…” She began quietly. “I wish I could cure you before the end. That would solve it, wouldn’t it? And no one else would have to die…”

“I wish, too,” he agreed, a sigh ruffling her hair. “But there’s no time left. Or...not enough, at least. And I couldn’t be sure it would work on me, not after...not after how much of me is the disease. What would be _left...?”_

He reached out with his free hand to tilt her head so they were face to face. “That’s not to tell you to give up,” he said gently. “Keep working. Find it, and-- and cure someone who deserves it more than I. Save someone else before the light takes that chance away.”

“You deserve it,” she insisted, frowning at him, but he shook his head.

“Not me, not anymore, not for a long time,” he told her. “And you know that.” He smiles faintly. “It’s...I love you for that, you know. You’re…you know what I am, what I’ve done and have yet to do, and you still love _me_. Even though I don’t deserve it, you give me your devotion all the same…” He leaned to kiss her temple, sweet and sad. “Promise me, though, Carina. Promise me that you’ll find your cure, and when you do you’ll use it. Save one more life for me, for the healer who failed.”

She swallowed tears, letting go of his hand to reach up and wrap her arms around his neck. “I promise,” she told him. “I will. But you didn’t fail, Ardyn. Even now, you’re-- you’re going to heal the world.” Her voice cracked. “You’re giving your life for the world, just like _he_ is. You haven’t failed...you’ll _succeed_. And I’ll do the same, I promise. _One more life._ ”

A single smoky tear ran down his face, and he reached to wipe it away. “Thank you,” he whispered. “That’s all I’ll ask.”

The motor of a car caught their attention, and they both looked up to see one of the hunters’ vans pulling into the in the distance, from the other end of the main road. “Go,” he said, helping her to her feet and standing. “Before they catch you missing, go. They’ll need you, I’m sure.”

She nodded, and moved to leave -- she stopped, though, turning back to kiss him one last time. “Ardyn, I--” She broke off when he pressed a finger to her lips, shaking his head. No more words, his eyes seemed to say, and she nodded. He took her hand one last time, giving it a squeeze, and then they broke apart. Reluctantly, their fingers lingering as long as they could, but they broke apart. He disappeared back into the darkness, and she slipped back into her apartment as if she’d never left.

Sania would ask later if she’d been crying, and she’d deny it -- how could she tell her, or anyone? She couldn’t. It was something she’d just...live with alone. 

Something she’d always have to live with; the pain would ease one day, she knew. It would ebb to a dull ache, nearly forgettable, but...she’d never forget. She’d promised him that, too. She would never forget. If that meant living with a hole in her heart until the day she died, then...it would be no burden.

Love was _never_ a burden, even if it hurt.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> timeskip! sadness! angst! 
> 
> she's trying, she really is, but there's only so much one girl can do, even if she's a scientist. she's doing her best.
> 
> she is working on a cure, though, but whatever she does whenever she does there won't be much of it. ;;
> 
> (yay, gladio/sania!! and also cameos from the Boys;; she's not the only one who's losing someone.)


	14. Chapter 14

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which the sun rises, and carina mourns.

Two years later, she woke up to the sun.

People were in the street shouting, celebrating, crying and holding each other, laughing -- it was hard not to feel a sense of relief and joy as the sun warmed their skin and lit the sky, blue as sylleblossoms now. Carina even joined them, letting one of the hunters pick her up and spin her around, letting Sania hug her tight enough to hurt, letting herself be pulled into the crowd. Maybe she could even smile.

But not entirely -- it didn’t meet her eyes, and she couldn’t stand it forever. She begged off eventually, promising to return in time for the party that was sure to come later on, and slipped away.

Phineas was there waiting when she entered the apartment, the eight year-old hopping off the bed (where he’d been staring out the window) and smiling at her. “Sun’s out,” he said, pointing. “Did you see?”

“I saw,” she told him, crouching to gather the boy in a hug. He was her greatest success, her proof, her...her child, really. Not by blood, of course; he barely remembered his parents but he was sure they were dead. But she’d saved him.

One more life, she’d promised Ardyn, and when she had it in her hands, the one syringe of a cure more precious than gold to her -- she fulfilled that promise. Greenie had been there beside her through ten years of darkness and several more years beside, the docile little tonberry that had lived beside her all this time. Who else would she cure? One more life, she’d promised, and Phineas was that life.

He was still a little off, she knew, still struggled to speak more than a few words at a time and still had a bit of a habit of carrying a flashlight with him as a security blanket...but he was human again. Human and alive, and that was what he’d wanted. What they’d _both_ wanted.

“Do you want to go and see it, Finny?” She asked, picking him up. “The sun. It’s been a long time since you’ve seen it, I’m sure.”

“Uh-huh!” He said with a nod. “It’s pretty.”

“It is, isn’t it?” She said, carrying him outside. She watched him stare at it in wonder and awe, reaching up as if to touch it, and smiled -- her first genuine smile the whole day. “It’s beautiful.” 

They’d all almost forgotten what it looked like, hadn’t they? What it felt like. But here it was. Golden and glorious above them like a god itself; the only god she’d likely ever worship again. The sun, brought back to them by the sacrifice of a good, brave young man.

And the death of the man she loved.

Because he was dead -- she knew what it meant that the sun had returned. It meant that Noctis Lucis Caelum was dead, given his life for the world. And it meant that Ardyn Lucis Caelum was dead, having been _killed_ to save the world.

She was happy that it was over, truly she was, but she couldn’t find the same joy in it that everyone else did. They didn’t know. They didn’t know what the world had lost in gaining its freedom from the darkness.

They didn’t know what _she’d_ lost. And unlike those three young men, who were likely also mourning, who had also lost...no one would mourn with her. It was the price to pay for loving the villain, she knew that. She had accepted it -- and at least he would have _someone_ to mourn him.

She stopped at a small hill nearby the outpost, putting Phineas down and sitting beside him. The boy snuggled closer to her, wrapping his arms around hers and leaning against her. “You’re sad,” he said finally, surprising her. “Why?”

“...I lost someone today,” she told him at length. “I wish you could have met him. You would have liked him -- or at least he would have liked you. He would have had stories to tell you, and...and you two would have gotten into quite a bit of trouble together. He was a good man.”

“What happened?” Phineas asked, eyes wide. “Why’s he gone?”

“He’s gone because--” She had to break off, wiping at her face. “He’s gone because he had to leave, so that the sun would come back. He and another boy both had to go.”

“Oh,” the boy said, and then climbed into her lap. “ _I’m_ here, though.”

“You’re here, yes,” Carina agreed with a shaky laugh. “And I’m very glad you are. Thank you, Finny.” He smiled up at her guilelessly, and she kissed the top of his head.

She’d sit here like this until she was ready to go back, she thought -- ready to face the joy the rest of the world had for this moment, ready to feel the same. But...for now, she wasn’t. Right now she needed time to mourn.

Dawn had come to Eos for the first time in ten years, the world was safe and the Scourge was gone, but...it had taken something away, too.

It had taken something _irreplaceable_. And though Carina knew in time it would hurt less, she also knew that a piece of her heart had gone with him. 

She just hoped that...she just hoped that he had peace, wherever he was now. That he was with the friends he’d lost all those years ago, and that he could finally, _finally_ rest.

And one day she’d join him -- but not for a very long while yet. She had things to do here, still.

But she’d remember him always, her beloved. The man who’d given her the heart he’d tried to deny, the man who’d laughed with her and danced with her and made her feel confident again. The tired, old man who had written books of his memories and who spent every day ignoring how much pain he was in, who loved sweets and chocobos and who had a ridiculous car and and even more ridiculous fashion sense. The man who only she knew, really, when the rest of the world saw the mask he wore to fool them all.

She’d remember him, and she’d love him, even after he was gone.

He deserved that much.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> shhhhh phineas makes sense just roll with it ok? she managed to make one dose of the cure before the dawn, and, well...greenie's been there the whole time ;v;
> 
> she deserves to have time to mourn, honestly. they all do.


	15. Chapter 15

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> epilogue: in which there's a happy ending.
> 
> (you don't have to take this as canon to the fic if you don't want to - i just needed them to be happy.)

A lot can happen in three weeks, Carina reflected, standing up and brushing her hands off. The hunters and the civilians had all returned to life as usual, returning to homes and families to rebuild what had been lost or broken. For Carina's part, she couldn’t -- and wouldn’t -- return to the Empire. But Tenebrae…

Her parents’ home was still there, she’d found. It had been closed up and quarantined given that it was a Scourge house, but it was still there. Dusty and quiet, but she fixed the latter soon enough. She’d only had two suitcases, but the house’s closets were still untouched. Really, all she’d needed to do was clean up the years of disuse and refill the pantry. 

Phineas loved it -- loved how big it was, loved the garden in the back...she was happy to see how well he was doing here. The sun was doing wonders for his health and his recovery. Even if he still had trouble talking sometimes, even if he sometimes ended up crawling into a box or closet for the darkness and quiet...he was doing better.

Better than _her_ , at least. She’d thought it would be easier, she reflected, but it wasn’t. She’d thought she’d accepted it, but clearly...clearly she hadn’t. 

Maybe it was using her parents’ things, seeing the matching mugs or evidence of their shared lives making her miss the what-could-have-beens. Maybe it was how large and empty the house was even with her and a child. Maybe it was just that she’d lied to herself for a decade and she was now struggling to hold it together in the wake of a loss she was still half-sure she could have prevented.

Logic said she couldn’t have saved him, logic said they’d both known that from the start. But her heart wasn’t as ruled by logic as her head, and her heart _ached_.

She wished she had a picture of him, at least, just one photo. But she didn’t -- all she had was old books, a scarf, his car keys, and she kept those on a side table alongside a vase of flowers, a memorial for a man no one else would remember.

She was in the kitchen making lunch for herself and Phineas -- who was outside playing -- and feeling rather oddly motherly, when she heard him calling her. She had to panic at first, a moment of blind fear, but no...no, there was nothing more to worry about. Either way, she hurried outside to see him standing in the small front yard, staring out into the distance. 

“What is it?” She asked, trying to see what he saw -- nothing, yet, but Phineas seemed to see things...differently, sometimes, possibly from his decades as a daemon. “What do you see?”

“Someone’s coming,” he told her. “I know him, but I don’t.” He didn’t take his eyes off the dirt road that lead through a field and in between a sparse wood and a lake, heading towards the train station. “That way,” he added, pointing in the direction he was watching.

“Someone’s...coming?” She asked, looking down at him and trying to puzzle out his words. Someone he knew, but didn’t…? One of the hunters, perhaps? Who else could it--

Her thoughts stopped along with her heart for a moment as someone rounded the last bend and stopped, as if uncertain. He was still some distance away, but she could make out details: dark clothes, hair the color of wine...she was in motion before her thoughts could restart, running down the path with tears already in her eyes and a traitorous hope in her heart. Could it be? _How_ could it be? Was it him?

She was halfway down the path when he closed the distance between them, his run a bit stilted, and she was in his arms even as she burst into tears, wrapping her arms around his neck as he picked her up with a laughing sob of his own.

“Ardyn!” She managed, crying into his shoulder. “You’re-- how did you-- you’re _here--_ I didn’t-- I thought--” She couldn’t speak through the tears, then, and from the shudder of his chest he didn’t seem much more capable of speech.

“I don’t know,” he rasped out finally, sounding torn between laughter and more tears. “I just-- I’m _here_. I died, I remember that, I-- I mean, _clearly_ I did, but then--” He shook his head. “I woke up again.” She can’t imagine how that must have felt; he’d waited so long to die then then...he came back?

“I don’t know if--” He swallowed, putting her down and pulling her close, arms around her waist so she could look up at him and see that the tears on his face were clear, no longer dark with the sign of the Scourge. “I don’t know if it was meant to be an apology or a punishment, but…” He smiled at her, and it lit his tired eyes. “You’re here. So I don’t think it really matters.”

“I’m here,” she agreed, smiling back at him. “And it doesn’t matter. You’re-- you’re human again. It’s _over_. Whether or not you’re alive or dead, you can...you can rest.”

“I am,” he said, sounding almost quietly wondrous. “And I can.” He kissed her forehead, and moved to take her hand. “There’s someone with you there,” he noted. “I can see him from here.”

“I promised you one more life, didn’t I?” Carina said softly, squeezing his hand. “It’s Greenie. Well...Phineas now.” She was about to say more but squeaked when he pulled her suddenly, tugging her close to hug her tightly and kiss her, more passionately than she could ever remember.

His eyes were bright with tears, and his smile was so fond and full of love it hurt. “You kept your promise,” he said, his voice shaking. “You-- you _did_ it.”

“I did,” she told him. “I really did.”

He spun her around and she gasped and giggled, grabbing the lapels of his coat to keep from falling. “Ardyn!” She yelped breathlessly, laughing. “You’ll make us both fall!”

He laughed with her -- his face was still wondrous, filled with a sort of relieved awe, both at peace and reveling in it. “No I won’t,” he promised, grinning. “Now come on, introduce me to your boy.”

 _“Our_ boy,” she corrected as she led him to the house, smiling even wider as he stumbled in surprise, looking at her like she’d just given him the world. “He’s ours, yours and mine.”

“Our boy,” he echoed, voice stunned and amazed. “Are you _sure_ this isn’t the afterlife?”

She laughed. “I’m sure,” she promised. “Now come on and meet him.”

\----

It was later that afternoon, the two of them wrapped around each other in bed, that Ardyn reached over her head to turn the radio on.

 _“---orry it took me so long to do something about it – I didn’t mean for it to,”_ Carina blinked, lifting her head up to listen to the unfamiliar voice. _“But it’s done, now, and we’re all still here. We can move on.”_

“...is that…?” She asked Ardyn, who was staring at the radio with a mixture of relief and something almost like fondness on his face.

“It is,” he said, smiling faintly. “Noctis came home too, it seems.”

“It’s a good thing the boys didn’t make any announcements yet,” she admitted, chuckling and leaning her head into Ardyn’s hand as he played with her hair. “It would have been hard to explain his return if they’d already admitted he was gone. But he’s back, and so are you, and...I suppose everyone is happy.”

“Mmm,” he agreed, still watching the radio and listening to the young king speak, stumbling over his gratitude and promises, awkward but sincere. He seemed like a good kid, Carina mused. She was glad he had been brought home, too. Part of her would have felt guilty if she’d been given back what the others had not. “I think he’ll be alright, don’t you?”

“He sounds sweet,” she said. “And his friends were all good kids...so yeah. I think he’ll be alright.”

She shifted to kiss Ardyn’s cheek. “And _we’ll_ be alright, too,” she added affectionately, reaching to turn off the radio. “We have our whole lives ahead of us now, and nothing more to fear.”

Ardyn just smiled, turning to kiss her and tugging her closer to him.

She may not have any love for the gods, but still...she sent them a silent prayer of thanks all the same. Regardless of what they’d done, they gave him back to her. Gave the king back to his companions.

That deserved thanks, at the very least. 

And now they could all be happy -- and never fear the darkness again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HAPPY HAPPY HAPPY ENDING FUCK IT 
> 
> AND I'M BRINGING BACK NOCTIS TOO BECAUSE EVERYONE DESERVES TO BE HAPPY.
> 
> let them be happyyyyyyyyy

**Author's Note:**

> Note: You might notice if you reread, but I changed Spica's name to Carina because #reasons. Still the same good baby girl tho!


End file.
